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Ryan Butta
Author
A Certain Kind of Power
Ryan Butta, author
Mike Costello operates on the edges of Argentina’s impenetrable bureaucracy, advising foreign business executives who struggle to grasp its unspoken rules. After ten years in Buenos Aries, he’s still near the bottom of the food chain. Still flummoxed or outraged daily by events that locals accept as ordinary. He fears being an eternal outsider. Mike decides to leave, but finds his assets frozen by government red tape. Capitalising on the delay, British diplomat Alex Harper persuades Mike to take on a new client, Simon Quinn, who has arrived to oversee construction of a railway. Government ministers see the project as a way to launder money. Quinn refuses to turn a blind eye. Alex fears the impasse will cause a diplomatic incident. He can help unfreeze Mike’s assets if Mike brokers peace. Public confrontations escalate the situation. A government envoy tells Mike he’ll be dead if he can’t persuade Quinn to cooperate. Quinn, as a client and a principled man, stirs Mike’s sense of professional and moral duty. Mike needs more options, which means getting more information and taking more risks. He’s drawn ever deeper into the contradictory reality of Argentine corruption. A man linked to the railway is murdered as a final warning that Mike cannot convince Quinn to heed. When Quinn himself is killed, Mike knows he is a loose end. Rushing to arrange his escape, he stumbles upon a devastating betrayal. Alex and Mike’s oldest friend have been conspiring against him. They manufactured the conflict surrounding the railway for political gain, despite knowing Mike would be caught in the middle. Mike once again has failed to understand his adopted country. He has an epiphany. His foreign concepts of morality and ethics have no place in Argentina. If he can abandon those notions, he will find his place here.
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