Murder Park

Get home. Get free. Get revenge. A five-year-old boy has been snatched from the worst housing project in the US and taken halfway round the world to the poisonous ruins of an abandoned city. But he's no ordinary kid; he's the rumored heir to a gangland empire like no other on Earth. And the race is on to take him back. A nineteen-year-old assassin created by that very same empire and now on the run in Manila.
For her, finding the boy could be her ticket home. A professional thief hiding from the mob father of the woman he loved. For him, finding the boy is his path to safety and redemption. A teenage gang member from one of Manila's worst slums. He doesn't want the boy - he wants one of the Americans turning the city upside down to find the kid, an American who killed his little brother. But beating him to the boy might give him a chance to take revenge.
From the typhoon-blasted toxic neighborhood they call 'the Concrete Sea' to the abandoned street-gang dueling ground of Murder Park, to find the kid they may have to pay a heavy price. And even if they can beat the bad guys to the child, will they turn him over to their employers to free themselves, or will they do the honorable thing - and risk it all against an individual whose influence courses through each and every dark street of near-future Manila?PRAISE FOR JOHN RICKARDS:"A huge talent" - Steve Mosby (Black Flowers, The 50/50 Killer)"Breathlessly classy" - The Telegraph"One of the most talented and original voices out there" - Jason Pinter (The Fury, The Darkness)"Smart and original" - Allan Guthrie (Two-Way Split, Kiss Her Goodbye)"Tight and brutal as a clenched fist" - Ray Banks (No More Heroes, Donkey Punch)"Intense, intelligent, engaging" - Elizabeth A.
White"[Rickards] has a definite flair for noir" - Adventures Of A Bookonaut"Tight and fast-paced" - The Fringe"Viscerally realized but also broodingly symbolic" - Crimeculture