Work of Idle Hands

If you had the opportunity, could you kill someone to prevent murder on a far greater scale? In this gripping new political thriller, former Ottawa civil servant Jonathon Platz casts his novelistic eye on the brutal government repressions that rocked South America in the 1970s. One man, Canadian Amnesty International worker Peter Quinfell, sees too much suffering and finally breaks under the strain. He becomes judge, jury and executioner for all those he believes have subverted the social contract between governor and governed. Quinfell’s actions lead to an international manhunt. But the unsuspecting key to the case is a burned-out RCMP officer with a troubled past. Unexpectedly, a missing file turns Harry Bruckner’s world upside down and sets him on a quest to find the mysterious assassin. The vividly portrayed horror of human rights violations provides a chilling backdrop to this tale of two individualists caught in a world of bureaucratic manipulation and its abstract relation to real human suffering. In their mutual search for justice, Quinfell and Bruckner enter a murky world of moral ambiguity that will leave the reader pondering the differences between right and wrong, good and evil.