Publisher's Weekly Review
Laukkanen's clever debut, the first in a new crime thriller series, compares favorably to Scott Smith's classic caper novel, A Simple Plan. Four college friends, who possess varying skills but are unable to find work in today's grim job market, decide to make money by kidnapping bankers and other extremely wealthy men around the U.S. The gang stays below law enforcement's radar by demanding ransoms so modest that the unharmed victims are inclined not to report their abduction. The group's luck runs out on a Michigan job when their target turns out to be connected to the Mafia, a mistake that starts an avalanche of violence. Their crime spree leads to the involvement of FBI agent Carla Windermere and Minnesota state investigator Kirk Stevens, who race the mob to catch the kidnappers. A few developments strain credulity, but the story's breakneck pace will carry most readers along. Author tour. Agent: Stacia Decker, Donald Maass Literary Agency. (Mar.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Booklist Review
Four recent college graduates joke about kidnapping people who have grown rich short-selling the American Dream. Facing careers as baristas, they act on the idea, and for two years they crisscross the country pulling off carefully planned, $60,000 snatches. None of their victims even notifies the police. But a hiccup in Minneapolis and a disaster in Detroit put them squarely in the sights of organized-crime hitters, FBI agent Carla Windermere, and Minnesota State Police detective Kirk Stevens. Debut novelist Laukkanen's interesting premise is supported by well-drawn characters, lots of action, solid procedural detail, and an unrelenting pace. Windermere and Stevens are planned to be series characters, and Laukkanen artfully manages to make sympathetic figures of both cops and kidnappers. Credulity gets strained a bit when the kidnappers overcome hired killers in several violent encounters and in the attraction between a young, black, and beautiful federal agent and the middle-aged, happily married white cop from St. Paul. Nevertheless, crime fans will find The Professionals an engaging and promising first novel.--Gaughan, Thomas Copyright 2010 Booklist
Kirkus Review
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Library Journal Review
Four friends, recent graduates from the University of Washington, are caught in a terrible job market. One of them jokes that they should go into kidnapping, and soon they develop a scheme to kidnap wealthy businessmen for relatively small ransoms ($60,000 to $100,000) so that the victims can be convinced not to report their kidnapping to the police. Their plan succeeds for two years until the friends kidnap the wrong man; his wife happens to be connected to the mob. Soon hot on their tails are not only the mob but also Minneapolis police investigator Kirk Stevens and FBI agent Carla Windermere. VERDICT This well-written debut crime novel features a chillingly postmodern amorality and well-developed protagonists on both sides of the law who will have readers rooting for them. Thriller fans will be chomping at the bit for the next Stevens and Windermere novel in the planned series.-Vicki L. Gregory, Univ. of South Florida Sch. of Information, Tampa (c) Copyright 2012. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
