Tagged with: ★ 4 Stars, 1960s, Assassination, Espionage, Hard-Boiled, Humorous, Kidnapping, North American, Politics, Washington D.C. It was only two years before he would win the Edgar Award for writing a Best First Novel for his debut book, The Cold War Swap. There are two partners, Mac McCorkle and Michael Padillo. It is called Mac’s Place and they are running it in the smack dab middle of the West German capital. As usual, Thomas, who won the Edgar Award for his first book, The Cold War Swap, writes an exciting and suspenseful. Two Americans are running a bar at the height of the Cold War tensions. One of them, Michael Padilloe keeps disappearing on business trips. It is the first book in the Mac McCorkle series. At the height of the Cold War, two Americans are running a bar in the West German capital. Read a full review of Cast a Yellow Shadow by Ross Thomas at Bitter Tea and Mystery. The Cold War Swap is one of Ross Thomas’s most celebrated books.

“Ross Thomas is without peer in American suspense.” - The Los Angeles Times A group of African terrorists want Padilla to assassinate the prime minister of their small sub-Saharan republic - and they’ve kidnapped Mac’s wife to use as leverage. Ross Thomas has written a series of 27 books. His new bride is beautiful, the bar is a success, and Padilla’s reappearance threatens everything. Most Recommended Books presents the Ross Thomas series written by Ross Thomas. Mac moved to Washington, DC, after the trouble in Bonn to get married and open his bar anew. Padilla was thought to be dead and erased from the CIA’s files - but now he’s back on the agency’s turf. They owned a bar together in Bonn, the West German capital, and stayed partners even after Padilla’s sideline as a CIA operative got the bar blown up. If you could, Mac McCorkle would disown Padilla. An old friend draws barman Mac McCorkle into a deadly international game.Īs the saying goes, you can’t pick your friends.

The Cold War Swap by Ross Thomas