A Talent for Killing

​LONG BEFORE JASON BOURNE, THERE WAS KANE

Kane was a top CIA assassin until he suffered traumatic physical and psychological injuries in a mission that went horribly wrong. The Agency wiped his memory, gave him a new identity, and retired him to a life of mundane, anonymous domesticity. But his training, and his talent for kiling, came back with a vengeance. He created a new life for himself as a killer-for-hire, righting wrongs for people who can't find peace or justice any other way. He doesn't know that his memories are fiction, or that he is always being watched, or that he's been targeted for death by a rogue faction within the Agency.

A TALENT FOR KILLING

In this brutal, fast-moving thriller from Ralph Dennis, the author of the legendary Hardman series of crime novels, Kane finds himself caught between the mob, Cuban revolutionaries, and his own government as he seeks retribution for a man murdered for uncovering small-town corruption...and justice for another man on death row, falsely convicted of raping and murdering a child.

Praise for Ralph Dennis

"Like Chandler and Hammett before him, Dennis was trying to do something different with what was thought of as throwaway literature." Joe R. Lansdale

"Ralph Dennis has mastered the genre and supplied top entertainment." New York Times

"Exceptional characterization, strong and vigorous prose." Mystery Scene Magazine

A portion of this book was previously published in 1976 under the title Deadman's Game

According to the publisher, Lee Goldberg (*True Fiction*) has combined Dennis’s *Deadman’s Game*(1976), his first Kane novel, with its unpublished sequel, substantially editing both in the process, to produce this breathless, lean noir thriller. Kane, a top-notch agent for the CIA, loses his memory after suffering a concussion during a botched mission that also leaves him with physical and emotional scars. After Kane leaves the CIA and becomes an assassin for hire, the agency decides to send one of their own, Bull Racklin, to eliminate him. Racklin tracks his quarry to Ansonville, Ga., where Kane has gone undercover to exact vengeance on members of the mob who murdered a man, Barton Fisk, who stole more than $100,000 from them and later roughed up Barton’s sister. In a subsequent case, Kane goes on the warpath to find the true killer of a five-year-old boy before the person wrongly imprisoned for the crime is executed. Dennis (1931–1988) doesn’t mince words. Every line is razor sharp and without an ounce of fat. Jason Bourne fans will find a lot to like. *(Sept.)*