The Double Eagle

**The Barnes & Noble Review**

Robert Ludlum meets *The Da Vinci Code* in James Twining's electrifying debut novel. It's an edge-of-your-seat thrill ride, set in the international art and antiquities marketplace, that deals with a missing set of priceless coins -- and the individuals who will do anything to possess them.

When an Italian priest is found murdered in Paris with an exceedingly rare American coin -- the 1933 Double Eagle -- lodged in his throat, the FBI is called in to investigate. Special Agent Jennifer Browne, trying to prove her competency after making a deadly mistake in her last mission, is assigned to the case. Though the handful of gold coins still in existence are supposed to be safely locked away in Fort Knox, when Browne visits the Kentucky depository, she discovers that all the coins are gone! When she finds a possible link between the Fort Knox theft and a rogue CIA agent reported dead ten years earlier, she tracks down "Tom Kirk" -- now an infamous art thief -- in London, and together they begin to unravel the elaborate puzzle. But as the pieces slowly fall into place, the two begin to realize that they're up against not only a ruthless criminal mastermind but also much more powerful -- and malevolent -- agencies

Fans of recent bestsellers like Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason's *The Rule of Four* and *The Third Translation* by Matt Bondurant will devour this adept blend of fact and fiction -- a high-speed (and highly intellectual) world-hopping thriller � la Ludlum, Ken Follett, and Frederick Forsyth. In a word: Sensational! iPaul Goat Allen/i