North Branch

by Jeff Mann

Happening upon a fatal traffic mishap on a rain-slick Michigan highway late at night, 35-year-old Ben Marshall succumbs to temptation and absconds with a cash-filled briefcase in the possession of the... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 059518037X
• ISBN13: 9780595180370
• Release Date: June 2001
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Length: 420 Pages
• Weight: 1.36 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.2" x 9.1"

Customer Reviews

Outstanding read!

Definitely an "on the edge of your seat" novel. Fast-paced, and extremely well written. Got hooked on the local setting, not to mention the unusual plot description, and I wasn't disappointed. Recommend it highly to anyone who loves a great story. This one's excellent!

One heckuva good read, from cover to cover.

If you love a great mystery/suspense novel, you won't be disappointed by North Branch. From the story's opening scenes, you'll have trouble putting it down. Told with a down-to-earth, midwestern perspective (refreshing!), and an amazing attention to setting and factual detail that makes it clear the author did his homework in every area...left me constantly wondering if it was really fiction. Well done!

A riveting suspense thriller with a unique twist!

Happening alone upon a fatal traffic mishap on a rain-slick Michigan highway late at night, 35-year-old Ben Marshall succumbs to temptation and absconds with a cash-filled briefcase in the possession of the elderly victim. Recently widowed, and still overwhelmed by his late wife's medical bills and the lingering pain of her infidelity, he finds it easy to rationalize a finders-keepers mentality. But, nagged by guilt...and terrified when he learns the accident victim is Michigan's senior U.S. Senator...he is too afraid to spend any of his ill-gotten fortune or risk the imagined consequences of returning it. Three weeks later, while still wavering, Marshall is stunned to discover a $2-a-week petty gambling habit has dealt him a second unexpected windfall. He is the sole winner of the Michigan Lotto drawing...and its $15-million jackpot! With official confirmation, comes the slow realization that it also provides the perfect cover for his original dilemma. But as carefully as Marshall has covered his tracks, he has unknowingly left footprints...missteps that ultimately catch the attention of those still scrambling to locate the heavy satchel they had delivered to the powerful chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee only an hour before his untimely death. Recovering an errant political influence pay-off is hardly the primary objective of the consortium of retired military officers who direct the operations of Barton Technologies, a Michigan-based defense contractor. Of far greater concern is the data storage disk that was lodged behind a flap inside the stolen briefcase. Arbitrarily deemed insignificant by Marshall when he first noticed the unlabeled diskette while in the distracting frenzy of counting and re-counting, its compressed file contents are in fact a cryptic record of criminal conspiracy extending far beyond one dead politician on the take.