In 1944, Willy Horvitz was a brilliant young physicist. Fervently anti-Nazi, he was coerced into leading a research and development effort to design and build a revolutionary new aircraft to turn the tide of the war. Adopted as an orphaned American boy by a wealthy German industrialist, Willy was haunted throughout his life by the tragic loss of his mother. The kind of loss he hoped wouldn’t be repeated if the personal secrets of those he held dear were revealed.
In 2008, Parker Dundee is a brilliant but unhappy young professor. While sifting through the possessions of his recently deceased father, Parker makes an unsettling discovery: his father was far more than the mid-level State Department bureaucrat he always portrayed himself to be. The deeper Parker gets into the labyrinth of his father’s secret life, the more attention he draws from sinister quarters.
Tying them together is the elusive “Mr. Abernathy”: a man known only through enigmatic references in scattered documents and journals spanning more than 100 years. His identity and secrets are of intense interest to the CIA, Russian thugs and a mysterious band of men known only as The Joneses.
Determined to know who his father really was, Parker realized he must first try to solve a larger and far more dangerous puzzle: who was Mr. Abernathy?
This was a surprisingly good little thriller which originally started as an online serial novel with a few chapters released every 10 days or so. Author Tony Delgrosso weaves past with present hinting that they are somehow connected but leaving enough open to keep the reader guessing.
The story jumps from following Willy Horvitz as he attempts to not successfully aid the Nazi’s in building a super aircraft while still conducting his own “spacey” experiments to following Parker Dundee and his struggle to translate personal documents of his late father’s even while staying under the radar of other powerful interested parties. There seems to be no connection between the past and present except for the illusive Mr. Abernathy and the super-creepy The Joneses which appear to both Willy and Parker. Yet, there is a surprising twist (which I had an idea of) that brings the entire story together in a most satisfying way.
If you enjoy a good quick mystery, Men In Black like creepies, possible time-traveling and aliens (?), I would recommend taking a look at Mr. Abernathy. As of this review, the serial version is still available online.
What about you, have you read any good time-traveling mysteries?
Thank you to the author for providing me with this book which did not influence my thoughts and opinions expressed in my review.
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08. Oct, 2009 at 4:34 am #
That book sounds really good, actually! Sounds pretty interesting!
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Sounds interesting. I may have to check it out on-line.
Hi Christine,
Beautiful new site – awesome. You just won the copy of The Hours that I am giving away. Send me your address at andilit at gmail.com, and I’ll get it off to you. Congras.
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