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by

Rick Riordan

Tres Navarre, private eye and sometimes English professor, is hoping for a laid-back working vacation when he accepts a teaching gig at the University of Texas at Austin, even if it means shacking up for six weeks with his big brother Garrett, who calls Austin home.

Garrett Navarre - computer programmer extraordinaire, Jimmy Buffett fanatic, and all-around eccentric - is hoping to retire a multimillionaire thanks to a high-tech start-up company he and two buddies have launched. Garrett has bet everything from his career to the Navarre family ranch that the company will stay alive long enough to make a public stock offering, allowing him to ride the Austin high-tech boom right into the saddle of luxury.

Both Tres's and Garrett's hopes are shattered with a single gunshot. Garrett's oldest friend and business partner ends up murdered at his lakefront home - and Garrett is the only suspect.

As Tres delves into Garrett's bizarre world to find the truth behind the murder, he comes face-to-face with the damaged relationships, violent lives, and billion-dollar schemes of a brave new high-tech world.

Among the players: a corporate takeover artist with a trail of broken enemies in his wake and an overzealous desire to make Garrett's company his own; the victim's wife, a hard-edged beauty haunted by three generations of family failure; and the head of an oil-rich clan with more power than morals and enough skeletons in the closet to man a ghost ship. Connecting them all - the beautiful waters of Lake Travis and an unspeakable evil that lies within its depths.

Rick Riordan is the author of four award-winning mystery novels from Bantam Books. His first, BIG RED TEQUILA, won the Anthony Award for Best Original Paperback Novel and the Shamus Award for Best First Private Eye Novel. His second book, THE WIDOWER'S TWO-STEP, won the Edgar Allen Poe Award for Best Original Paperback Novel of 1999. His newest novel, THE DEVIL WENT DOWN TO AUSTIN, has been nominated for both the Anthony and the Shamus Awards for Best Mystery Novel of 2001. His short fiction has appeared in Mary Higgins Clark Mystery Magazine and Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine.

In addition to writing, Rick teaches middle school at Saint Mary's Hall. A San Antonio native and graduate of Alamo Heights and UT Austin, he is certified in both English and history, and has taught for fourteen years in both public and private schools, at middle and high school levels. He lives in San Antonio with his wife and two sons.