Trading Reality

Virtual reality is the technology of the future, and Mark Fairfax’s brother Richard runs the leading company in the field worldwide. He has also been murdered.

Mark is a City trader: sharp, young, ambitious. He is left to pick up the pieces at his brother’s company in Scotland’s “Silicon Glen”.

Struggling to keep the business in the black, and with corporate predators closing in, Mark must learn fast and trust no one.

With his brother’s killer on the loose, bankruptcy may prove to be the least of his problems.

This is the second of Michael Ridpath’s bestselling financial thrillers, which have been published in over 30 countries. The author invested in a world-leading British virtual reality company while working for a venture-capital firm in London.

PRAISE FOR MICHAEL RIDPATH’S FINANCIAL THRILLERS: “Ridpath has that read-on factor that sets bestsellers apart.” - The Guardian

“It is the author's insight into the complexities of the business that gives his novel so much life. And he can write... Yes, he has a winner here.” - The New York Times

“It’ll send a shiver down bankers’ spines.” - Mirror

“The author makes you feel the intensity of the trading floor, the combination of number-crunching and gut instinct that leads people to take big risks, the thrill of playing a hunch and getting it right.” - Los Angeles times Book Review

“For sheer entertainment, there's nothing in the mystery genre to beat a well-constructed thriller… …the new book of Michael Ridpath provides a master-class in how it's done. I read it in one gulp." - The Observer

“As slick and compulsive a piece of storytelling as can be found in the best of blockbuster fiction.” - Sunday Express.

From Publishers WeeklyHigh tech and high finance make a natural pair, in real life and now in fiction thanks to Ridpath (Free to Trade), whose second novel features desperate characters trading in reality of the virtual kind. Narrator Mark Fairfax, a London bond trader, discovers that his brother Richard has been murdered in Scotland just as Richard's firm, FairSystems, was on the verge of a fundamental breakthrough in virtual reality (VR) technology. As Mark takes charge of FairSystems and tries to fulfill his brother's dreams, it becomes increasingly obvious that the murder has something to do with the breakthrough?and that Richard was not the only victim. Mark has his hands full trying to learn his way around VR while fending off hostile takeovers, cash-flow crises, terrorists and attempts on his life. He also has to deal with being dumped by one lover and finding a new one. Ridpath's pacing is brisk, and his use of largely Scottish settings is a welcome change from the usual American suspense backdrop. His characters are painted in broad strokes but, then, the thrills here lie as much in carefully thought out financial and digital tools as in the humans who wield them. Drawing on classic thriller elements, Ridpath has written a clever, if not very original, story with a trendy spin and a satisfying conclusion that should have readers buying up copies as fast as you can say "Bill Gates." $50,000 ad/promo; UK, translation, first serial, dramatic rights: Writer's House. Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library JournalWith this exciting, suspenseful novel about skullduggery in the stock market, Ridpath should exceed the success of his first novel, the best-selling Free To Trade (LJ 11/1/94). Mark Fairfax is a bond trader turned entrepreneur when his brother is murdered, and he has to take over his brother's company. He finds that it has a virtual reality product that could make it the next Microsoft, worth billions, and that many people want to steal it out from under him. Its stock is being manipulated, and it is being forced toward sale or bankruptcy. In finding out who is doing this, Mark also learns who murdered his brother. Ranking with the best of Paul Erdman's financial thrillers, this is an essential purchase for popular fiction collections.-?Marylaine Block, St. Ambrose Univ. Lib., Davenport, IowaCopyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.