most accounts a successful freelance hit man who travels on assignments by his Agent, Stan, but he starts to weigh the cost. Luke has a home in South Carolina and a condo in Mexico. In this novella we follow his travels on a series of assignments which take him from Finger Lakes, N.Y. State, to nearby Buffalo, from there to Quebec City, Canada and on to Napa Valley, California. The novel examines the day-to-day concerns and activities of a man who kills to make a living. He is a multifaceted individual with interests which include literature, sports, scuba diving and fine food and wine. He is introspective and comes to question both his activities and his future. Because he lives a secretive existence, which prevents him from sharing with others, his humor is largely internalized and ironic. Over time he comes to question his present occupation and considers a possible romantic commitment which would require some explanation of what he had been doing for the past ten years. Luke is proficient and impersonal in his professional activities, but becomes increasingly aware of the inevitable isolation which he ultimately faces. He is no more an island than the rest of us. When love rears its head and washes up onto his shore, he is tugged and battered by the age old tide. However, his baggage weighs heavily as he seeks to break free from the path he has chosen. Because he has lived a solitary, secretive life, and ‘knows where the bodies are buried’, it is not so easy to ‘live happily ever after’.

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