The Boy from Reactor 4 (Nadia Tesla) - Softcover

Stelmach, Orest

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1612186084 ISBN 13: 9781612186085

Publisher: Thomas & Mercer, 2013

Synopsis

Nadia’s memories of her father are not happy ones. An angry, secretive man, he died when she was thirteen, leaving his past shrouded in mystery. When a stranger claims to have known her father during his early years in Eastern Europe, she agrees to meet—only to watch the man shot dead on a city sidewalk. With his last breath, he whispers a cryptic clue, one that will propel Nadia on a high-stakes treasure hunt from New York to her ancestral homeland of Ukraine. There she meets an unlikely ally: Adam, a teenage hockey prodigy who honed his skills on the abandoned cooling ponds of Chernobyl. Physically and emotionally scarred by radiation syndrome, Adam possesses a secret that could change the world—if she can keep him alive long enough to do it. A twisting tale of greed, secrets, and lies, The Boy from Reactor 4 will keep readers guessing until the final heart-stopping page.

About this title

About the Author

Orest Stelmach was born in Connecticut, the child of Ukrainian immigrants. He didn’t speak English until he began school as a child, going on to earn academic degrees from Dartmouth College and the University of Chicago. Along the way he earned his living washing dishes and stocking department-store shelves, later teaching English in Japan and managing international investments. In 2012, his short story “In Persona Christi” was published in the Mystery Writers of America anthology Vengeance. He speaks Ukrainian, Spanish, and Japanese. The Boy from Reactor 4 is his first novel.

From Booklist

This debut thriller takes the reader from New York to Ukraine. Nadia Tesler is an immigrant’s daughter, and while she is fluent in Russian, she is not close to her mother and lost her father as a young teenager. All she remembers of him is a perpetually angry man, and she knows nothing of her family background. A stranger contacts her, saying he knew her father well, and they arrange a meeting, but he is shot dead on the street in front of her, whispering a cryptic message as he dies. She quickly realizes her own life is in danger and sets out on a quest to decipher the message, learn some of her family history, and keep one jump ahead of whoever is after her. It isn’t until she visits her ancestral homeland that she really starts deciphering her family story. The key turns out to be Adam, a young hockey star who grew up skating at Chernobyl and now suffers from radiation syndrome; he has a secret that many want—and will kill to get. This is a fast ride with lots of thrills and will appeal to adrenaline junkies. — Stacy Alesi

About this edition

• Publisher: Thomas & Mercer
• Publication date: 2013
• ISBN 10: 1612186084
• ISBN 13: 9781612186085
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 388