Hard Latitudes

Mike Travis #4: “Hard Latitudes” by Baron R. Birtcher. May Ling is raped and held captive as a sex slave in Hong Kong. Unknown to her, this will culminate in violence and death as events move to the US, where she is to be a pawn in a deadly duel between the Chinese and a pharmaceutical giant.

Mike Travis Kamahale Van de Groot gave up his name and position in the Van de Groot family-empire to become his own man. After a career as a police detective in L.A., he moved to Kona, Hawaii to live on his sailboat. But trouble continues to follow him. His brother is his latest problem. Valden Van de Groot is a predator of women, and he’s in a mess again. It seems he picked up a 17-year-old girl in an L.A. hotel lounge, and their bedroom activity was videotaped. Now someone is blackmailing him for three million dollars, and Valden wants his brother to take care of the problem.

After taking care of the L.A. problem in the first half of the book, Mike Travis returns to Hawaii, where he encounters the pharmaceutical giant of industry, Phillip Lennox and his son, J.R. Someone has kidnapped J.R.’s son, and Phillip’s grandson, and J.R. wants Mike to find him. Now the three stories come together, as the boat May Ling is on flounders in the sea, and the crew has abandoned ship. It’s being towed to Hawaii, and may prove disastrous to Phillip Lennox’s empire, and Mike Travis fills in all the blanks from his brother’s blackmail to the child’s kidnapping, and the Chinese connection with Lennox’s pharmaceuticals and the tragic story of May Ling.

A very complicated plot that all comes together in the end. This story is well written, and keeps our interest with believable action, and memorable characters.