Louisiana Hydra by Gregory Ryman
What's It About?
CIA hacker William Stinson and high-priced international consultant Stephanie Borden are thrown together in a race to not only save their own lives but to unravel a conspiracy that would take them across the globe.In this breakout series debut, a legendary CIA hacker and a savvy international consultant pair up to solve the assassination of a U.S. senator — only to discover they are next on the hit list. They slowly uncover a many-headed serpent of criminal data collection, smuggling and murder in Louisiana Hydra by Gregory Ryman.
William Stinson is the best-kept and closely guarded secret of the CIA, a legend in the international hacking community, who works covertly from his home office in Washington. D.C. One morning, he stops to enjoy a coffee at an outdoor café, tucking in with a good book.
At the same time, Stephanie Borden, a well-connected consultant, takes a seat at the patio table next to Stinson’s. She is there to meet Senator Michael Glenway to discuss the worrying disappearance of a whistle-blower about to share urgent national security information. It is a sunny and warm October day.
Then, a puffing sound and a light spray of blood freckle the back of William’s hand. After a second “puff” of air, he sees the shocked face of the beautiful stranger across from him, staring at the lifeless body of her companion. William grabs for her hand and they dash from danger, with a loud plunk! hitting Stephanie’s vacant chair in the chaos of screaming and running people.
Chasing Down an International Conspiracy
With this dramatic opening, Ryman introduces a new political thriller series with two enigmatic characters thrown together by chance who, despite their past traumas and pain, create one hell of a sleuthing tag team. William and his vast underground office of high-tech gear and surveillance equipment become a safe house for Stephanie as she recovers from a second attempt on her life.
Along with William’s CIA colleague, Carl Stubbs, and his crack technical team, they will pool their technological know-how — and Stephanie’s chutzpah — to chase down the next lead that, like a Russian nesting doll, hides another mystery inside of a riddle wrapped in an enigma.
This chase will lead them to Oxford, England, to find the whistle-blower’s evidence and then on to Paris for the next clue, before finally leading them all back to a corrupt politician in Louisiana with a sinister and mysterious “friend” who knows more than everyone combined.
Explosive Plot with Shocking Ending
Ryman’s plot is clever, original, and more than a bit terrifying. Touching on the controversial uses (and misuses) of artificial intelligence, Ryman deftly pivots to the Covid pandemic and the frightening possibility of wholesale medical data collection worldwide by a bevy of bad actors. It is enough to keep the reader up late into the night.
William and Stephanie do not reveal all of themselves in this first installment, which is smart storyboarding by Ryman. William’s life as a widower is shared early on, but Stephanie remains more of a mystery — both to herself and the reader. After an explosive and shocking ending, this becomes more of an urgent request in the sequel.
Louisiana Hydra is a page-turning political thriller that combines tech-savviness, wry dialogue, and an unsettling vision of criminality in the 21st century. What more can you ask for? Highly recommended.
Louisiana Hydra is also available for purchase on Google Play.
About Gregory Ryman:
Before retirement, Gregory Ryman spent most of his career in the technology field: operations, programming, data analysis, and more. Retirement resulted in dramatically expanding the amount of spare time he had available — and apparently, there is a limit to the number of home improvement projects one can take on before their significant other starts pointing to the back door saying, “No. Out. Dig a ditch or whatever. Just stop doing things in here.” He’s a lousy ditch-digger though, so writing seemed like a reasonable alternative.
Gregory is a big fan of authors such as John Sandford, David Baldacci, Michael Connelly, Lee Child, Ian Rankin and Jo Nesbo. It was Stephen King, though, who changed him from a passive reader of whatever crossed his line of sight into a reader who would end up drumming his fingers on the desk, waiting for that next book to come out.
