With The Innocent, Taylor Stevens, the bestselling author of The Informationist, returns with another blockbuster thriller featuring the fearless Vanessa Michael Munroe.Eight years ago, a man walked five-year-old Hannah out the front doors of her school and spirited her over the Mexican border, taking her into the world of a cult known as The Chosen. For eight years, followers of The Prophet have hidden the child, moving her from country to country, shielding the man who stole her. Now, those who've searched the longest know where to find her. They are childhood survivors of The Chosen, thirty-somethings born and raised inside the cult who've managed to make lives for themselves on the outside. They understand the mindset, the culture within that world, and turn to Vanessa Michael Munroe for help, knowing that the only possibility of stealing Hannah back and getting her safely out of Argentina is to trust someone who doesn't trust them, and get Munroe on...

A master of international intrigue, New York Times bestselling author Taylor Stevens introduces a pair of wild cards into the global spy game—a brother and sister who were raised to deceive—and trained to kill . . . They live in the shadows, Jack and Jill, feuding twins who can never stop running. From earliest memory they've been taught to hide, to hunt, to survive. Their prowess is outdone only by Clare, who has always been mentor first and mother second. She trained them in the art of espionage, tested their skills in weaponry, surveillance, and sabotage, and sharpened their minds with nerve-wracking psychological games. As they grew older they came to question her motives, her methods—and her sanity . . . Now twenty-six years old, the twins are trying to lead normal lives. But when Clare's off-the-grid safehouse explodes and she goes missing, they're forced to believe the unthinkable: Their mother's paranoid delusions...

Vanessa “Michael” Munroe deals in information—expensive information—working for corporations, heads of state, private clients, and anyone else who can pay for her unique brand of expertise. Born to missionary parents in lawless central Africa, Munroe took up with an infamous gunrunner and his mercenary crew when she was just fourteen. As his protégé, she earned the respect of the jungle's most dangerous men, cultivating her own reputation for years until something sent her running. After almost a decade building a new life and lucrative career from her home base in Dallas, she's never looked back. Until now.   A Texas oil billionaire has hired her to find his daughter who vanished in Africa four years ago. It’s not her usual line of work, but she can’t resist the challenge. Pulled deep into the mystery of the missing girl, Munroe finds herself back in the lands of her childhood, betrayed, cut off from civilization, and left for dead. If she has any hope of escaping the jungle and the demons that drive her, she must come face-to-face with the past that she’s tried for so long to forget.

They took her. Then they took her family. Now she's coming for retribution. Information specialist Vanessa Michael Munroe has a reputation for getting things done, often dangerous and not-quite-legal things. Scarred from a life of violence, pursued by her own demons, and as proficient with languages as she is with knives, when a human trafficking ring kidnaps her to transport a high-profile starlet, she's prepared to destroy those responsible--until she discovers that to save one life, she will condemn the person she loves most. Plunged into an underground world where women and girls are merchandise and a shadowy figure known as The Doll Maker controls her every move, Munroe must choose who lives, who dies, or find a way to outthink and outsmart a man who holds all the cards. In this high-octane thriller for fans of Lee Child, Barry...

They were born in the shadows. Schooled in espionage. Taught to kill and trained to disappear. In this captivating masterwork from bestselling author Taylor Stevens, elusive twins Jack and Jill take the global spy game to electric levels. The assassin broker is dead. The power void has left the network he controlled without restraints, and the world's deadliest killers free to pursue their own vendettas and political agendas. The United States government, unwilling to risk upheaval and global chaos, has mobilized killers of its own to preemptively hunt down and destroy each potential threat. Among the most dangerous on that list are Jack and Jill. Often estranged—always connected by a legacy they can't escape—the siblings have eluded many who want them dead. As they board a flight to Berlin hoping to meet the father they've never known, they suspect a trap. What they can't predict is how far a...

Some people were easy to find. Others took hunting and patience. The most difficult was a target who knew she was coming, and he knew. How could he not? When you backed a predator into a corner, when you took and destroyed all that she loved, when you made a game of ruining lives and sadism for you was sport, but then you failed to kill the predator: you’d better know she was coming back. This was an inviolable law. She wasn’t dead, and so she was coming for him. She had his face, had the name of a city. In the right hands, anything could be mined into so much more. She would find him. Kill him. Simple as that.

*“Munroe is a sensational character and Stevens is a sensational writer.” —Lee Child, New York Times bestselling author of the Jack Reacher series  For fans of Lee Child, Terry Hayes, and Laura Lippman comes a blistering thriller in which Vanessa Michael Munroe faces the fight of her life  Vanessa Michael Munroe, chameleon and information hunter, has a reputation for getting things done: dangerous and not quite legal things that have taken her undercover into some of the world’s deadliest places. Still healing from a Somali hijacking gone wrong and a brutal attack that left her near death, Munroe joins her lover, Miles Bradford, in Japan where he’s working as a security consultant protecting high-value technology from industrial espionage. In the domesticity of their routine she finds long sought-after peace—until Bradford is arrested for murder, and the same interests who targeted him come after her, too.    Searching for answers and fighting to stay alive, Munroe will soon discover how far she’ll go to save Bradford from spending the next twenty years in locked-up isolation; how many laws she’ll break when the truth seems worse than his lies; and who to trust and who she must kill. Because she’s a strategist and hunter with a predator’s instincts, and the man she loves has just stabbed her in the back.        With break-neck pacing, incendiary prose, and an unforgettable cast of characters, The Mask* features Vanessa Michael Munroe: a brilliant, lethal heroine who will stop at nothing to find the truth, no matter what it may cost.  “Stevens excels at depicting pulse-pounding danger, and her prose and plotting are spectacular. . . . Only Dan Brown and Lee Child come close.” —Dallas Morning News “[Munroe is] a protagonist as deadly as she is irresistible.” —Vince Flynn“If you are a fan of Jack Reacher, Lisbeth Salander, or Nina Zero, you need to check out Vanessa Michael Munroe!” —BookPage“A winning series character who has the world at her beck and call.” —Los Angeles Times“Munroe’s brooding personality and her ability to blend into her surroundings bring to mind the provocative Jason Bourne.” —USA Today From the Hardcover edition.**

“Intelligent writing, masterful pacing, and tense and fluid action scenes that feel ready-made for the cinema." —*Associated Press*   Vanessa Michael Munroe, chameleon and information hunter, has a reputation for getting things done—often dangerous and not quite legal things.    The adrenaline-fueled work has left her with blood on her hands and a soul stained with guilt. Having borne the burden of one death too many, Munroe has fled to Djibouti, Africa. There, where her only responsibility is greasing the wheels of commerce for a small maritime security company, she finds stillness—until her boss pressures her to join his team as an armed transit guard on a ship bound for Kenya.    Days into the voyage, Munroe discovers the security contract is merely cover for a gunrunning operation of which she wants no part. The ship is invaded off the Somali coast and in a moment of impulse while fighting her way out, she drags the unconscious captain with her. But nothing about the hijacking is what it seems.    The pirates were never after the ship; they’d come for the captain. In chasing him, they make their one mistake: targeting Munroe raises the killer’s instinct she’s tried so hard to bury. Wounded and on the run, Vanessa Michael Munroe will use the life of her catch as bait and bartering chip to manipulate every player with a stake in the ship’s outcome, and find a way to wash her conscience clean.From the Hardcover edition.From BooklistIn this sequel to The Doll (2013), Vanessa Michael Munroe is utilizing her gift for languages, living in Djibouti as Michael, a man, and working as an interpreter for a maritime security company. Her latest assignment finds her aboard a ship, which she quickly discovers is running guns. The ship is attacked by pirates off the Somali coast, but Munroe escapes, taking the captain with her. Turns out the captain is really what the pirates were after, and she hides him in a small private hospital while she tries to figure out her next move. The plan? Hijack the ship back, of course. This action-adventure thriller moves along at breakneck speed with the requisite violence peppering most of the pages. Munroe is a smart, fiercely strong, yet damaged woman in the vein of Lisbeth Salander, and she could hold her own with Robert Ludlum’s Jason Bourne or Barry Eisler’s Rain. For fans of high-energy action. --Stacy Alesi Review“Think Catwoman in plain clothes. Lisbeth Salander sans dragon tattoo. Jack Reacher with an extra X-chromosome. Whatever—Vanessa Michael Munroe has to be among the cleverest, fightingest and all-around baddest heroines in contemporary suspense fiction. …A straight-up adventure tale about a woman who thinks on her feet (that is, when she is not using them to kick bad-guy booty) and always stays one step ahead of her adversaries. My prediction: This will be one of the summer’s most popular beach reads.” —BookPage "This writer is fabulous and the characterizations are thrilling... You get what you see, and that includes the cleverness, the grit, and the pain. A definite keeper!” —Suspense Magazine“Thriller fans will immediately be sucked into this life-or-death tale as Stevens’s fast-paced plot and indomitable and justice-driven heroine keep the pages turning.” —Library Journal “This action-adventure thriller moves along at breakneck speed with the requisite violence peppering most of the pages. Munroe is a smart, fiercely strong, yet damaged woman in the vein of Lisbeth Salander, and she could hold her own with Robert Ludlum’s Jason Bourne or Barry Eisler’s Rain. For fans of high-energy action.” —*Booklist “Stevens resurrects Vanessa “Michael” Munroe, her dangerous, androgynous antihero, for another dark adventure…Fans of the series like that Stevens’ writing takes them to little-known places and offers glimpses into the day-to-day life of the economically developing world. Stevens continues her spare, gritty approach to storytelling, which has made Munroe one of the genre’s most compelling characters, in this latest installment of the haunted heroine’s troubled life.”** —Kirkus*

"A heroine every bit as provocative as Stieg Larsson's Lisbeth Salander." --The Dallas Morning NewsThey took her. Then they took her family. Now she's coming for retribution. Information specialist Vanessa Michael Munroe has a reputation for getting things done, often dangerous and not-quite-legal things. Scarred from a life of violence, pursued by her own demons, and as proficient with languages as she is with knives, when a human trafficking ring kidnaps her to transport a high-profile starlet, she's prepared to destroy those responsible--until she discovers that to save one life, she will condemn the person she loves most. Plunged into an underground world where women and girls are merchandise and a shadowy figure known as The Doll Maker controls her every move, Munroe must choose who lives, who dies, or find a way to outthink and outsmart a man who holds all the cards. In this high-octane thriller for fans of Lee Child, Barry...