Shoot Him if He Runs-Stuart wOODS

Shoot Him if He Runs
Stuart Woods
Putnam, Oct 2007, $25.95, 304 pp.
ISBN: 9780399154947

Teddy Fay was a CIA agent for many years and he was perfect in his operations until he started killing people he believed were detrimental to the country he loved and served. When last seen in IRON ORCHID he was escaping from a building on fire and was assumed dead. It is now believed he is alive and living in the Caribbean island of St. Marks. The American public believes he is dead and if they find out otherwise, the chances of the president’s reelection are close to zero.

The president sends Agent Holly Barker, lawyer Stone Barrington and police officer Dino Bacchetti to St. Marks to see if they can find an identify Teddy. Holly has the best shot of doing so because she has seen him twice before albeit in costume. Down there, the new prime minister is closer to a dictator than a democratic president and his chief of security served in Haiti under Papa Doc. The three Americans run afoul of the government between their being bugged and Holly and Stone arrested. When they are free the two are ordered home but the PM has sealed off the island because his security chief was assassinated with all the trade marks of a Teddy hit.

Start Woods teams up Stone Barrington and Holly Barker and their collaboration in the bedroom and on a professional level makes SHOOT HIM If He RUNS one of the author’s finest works to date. They have much in common and work well together, so much so that they should be teamed up more often. Teddy Fay is such an expert in disguises and there are so many shady expatriates on the island that Holly and Stone have to work triple time to find out if Teddy is on the island.

Harriet Klausner