Burn

The book opens with a scene from later on: in a bar on the ship «Silver Mist», Jenner Redwine sits on a cold bar stool, acting in fear. A drunk Tiffany accuses Cael Traylor of «sleeping with her», but it is a staged show: two strangers must seem to have met «by chance». Jenner does it for Syd, because her closest friend is in their hands. On deck Cael makes her kiss him and Jenner freezes. Then the novel jumps back «seven years».

Seven years earlier, 23-year-old Jenner works the second shift at a meat-packing plant in Chicago. Her feet ache, and she is supporting her boyfriend Dylan, who will not even pay for his own beer. That night she throws him out and celebrates with her friend Michelle at the «Bird» bar. Before that she had bought three lottery tickets at a «Seven-Eleven», choosing numbers from birthdays, phone numbers and addresses. On Monday she hears her co-workers say the 295-million-dollar prize has not been claimed and checks the numbers 7, 11, 23, 47, 53, 67 in the paper against her ticket several times.

Joy gives way to fear. Jenner has never had a bank account and learns the words «financial planning» from the yellow pages. She picks «Payne Ekol» and meets Al Smith, a 27-year-old advisor on the lower rungs. Al speaks plainly: after tax roughly half the money will remain, most lottery winners lose it within five years, so it must be protected. The person Jenner fears most is her father Jerry: a man who pays no rent, is expert at finding loopholes, and would be the first to come for her money if he heard.

Getting the money takes four to eight weeks, and Jenner stays at her job in the meantime. The news has spread: the phone never stops, relatives and strangers ask for help, Dylan sues for half, and co-workers resent «why is she still working here». The supervisor, Dan Gorski, suggests she leave. Jenner reads the settlement line by line, insists on the missing date, copy and signature clauses, and only leaves the plant with compensation once she holds the full document. Her sharp, street-learned mind and her suspicion of every paper show clearly here.

She finally gets the money: a photo shoot, an oversized show cheque, a new Toyota Camry. The lawyer William Lourdes turns Dylan's suit in Jenner's favour. Jenner goes shopping with Michelle but quickly gets bored and sees it does not fill her. The hardest blow comes from Michelle: at «Bird» she makes Jenner pay a 94-dollar tab, says «you changed after you got the money», and calls Jenner a bitch. That night the ATM shows «insufficient balance»: her father Jerry tore a cheque out of the chequebook and took 27,400 dollars. Jenner does not report him to the police.

Part one ends here. Part two («Bad Luck») begins seven years later and the camera moves to Cael Traylor: born in Israel, a Jewish mother and a Mississippi father, once a Mossad operative, now running covert operations in the US behind a car-wash business. A shadowy contact in the US government gives him a job: the «green initiative» millionaire Frank Larkin will meet a North Korean company in Hawaii, and the time and place of that meeting must be found out. Larkin is the host of the first voyage of the charity ship «Silver Mist». Cael's team: Tiffany as his «wife», a second couple, Ryan and Faith, and Matt, placed in the crew.

Seven years on, Jenner is thirty, lives in Palm Beach, has doubled her money with Al's help, and between charity dinners, courses, sailing and diving lessons still thinks of herself as a «meat packer». Her one true friend is the heiress Syd Hazlett: once, when Jenner froze before five forks at her first formal dinner, Syd quietly showed her which to start with. Now Syd invites her on a two-week charity voyage her father cannot join at the last minute. Jenner likes the view and only laughs at the idea of finding rich, «honest, available» men on a ship, because she suspects everyone who approaches of wanting «her money».

The other thread is Larkin: his headaches never stop, he feels something growing in his brain, while his doctor says it is not cancer. Believing death is near, he considers himself free of everything and sees plots everywhere. Seeing Ryan and Faith Naterra next to his own suite on the passenger list, he grows suspicious and reshuffles all the rooms. Cael's team loses its key position; on one side of Larkin are an elderly, hard-of-hearing couple, on the other Syd and Jenner. Looking at the photographs, Cael changes his plan: Syd seems soft and easily broken, while the harder-looking Jenner might «play well».

• Chapters switch between the viewpoints of Jenner, Cael, Larkin, Tiffany and others; this raises tension but sometimes cuts off mid-scene
• The chapters showing Larkin's sick mind (tumour, headaches, paranoia) are the darkest and best-written parts of the book
• The sarcastic dialogue between Jenner and Cael is the main source of romantic tension
• The shipboard setting (lifeboat drill, yoga class, costume party, «bachelor auction») is detailed and lively
• The heroes' inner monologue about «trying to resist attraction» repeats over several hundred pages and slows the reading