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    Layover in Dubai: A Novel
    Layover in Dubai: A Novel
    Layover in Dubai: A Novel
    Audiobook10 hours

    Layover in Dubai: A Novel

    Written by Dan Fesperman

    Narrated by Christopher Lane

    4/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    Sam Keller has been enlisted by his V.P. for Corporate Security and Investigation to spy on another employee while they’re traveling for the company. Ordinarily careful to a fault, Sam decides to live it up. What better spot for business-class hedonism than boomtown Dubai, where resort islands materialize from open ocean, fortunes are made overnight, and skiers crisscross the snowy slope of a shopping mall.

    But when Sam’s charge is murdered during a night on the town, it is only the first in a series of bewildering events that plunge him waist-deep into a lethal mix of mobsters, prostitutes, crooked cops, consuls, and corporate players.

    Offering a chancy way out is Anwar Sharaf, the unlikeliest of detectives. A former pearl diver and gold smuggler with an undignified demeanor, Sharaf is sometimes as baffled as Sam by the changes to his homeland, especially as they are embodied in the behavior of his rebelliously independent—and hauntingly beautiful—daughter. But he knows where the levers of power reside. As the unlikely duo work their way toward the heart of the case, each man must confront the darkest forces threatening Dubai from within.

    Here is Dan Fesperman’s most suspenseful novel yet: a stunning portrait of a city whose mysterious rhythm (“like the precision throb of an artificial heart, clicking and insistent, yet cool to the touch”) is underscored by the insistent clashing of old and new.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBrilliance Audio
    Release dateJul 13, 2010
    ISBN9781423346784
    Layover in Dubai: A Novel
    Author

    Dan Fesperman

    Dan Fesperman’s travels as a writer have taken him to thirty countries and three war zones. Lie in the Dark won the Crime Writers’ Association of Britain’s John Creasey Memorial Dagger Award for best first crime novel, The Small Boat of Great Sorrows won their Ian Fleming Steel Dagger Award for best thriller, and The Prisoner of Guantánamo won the Dashiell Hammett Award from the International Association of Crime Writers. He lives in Baltimore.

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    Reviews for Layover in Dubai

    4/5

    67 ratings7 reviews

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    • 4/5
      Not one of Fesperman's better books. It is a quick, enjoyable read, and he does a great job of using Dubai as a character, but it is rather superficial story (with some wildly implausible parts).
    • 4/5
      I read a lot of crime and spy fiction, usually series. I read Dan Fesperman’s stand-alone novel, “Layover in Dubai”, (LD) for three reasons – I had just read some very favorable comments about Dan while scanning a review of another author’s work, the Amazon readers’ reviews were well over a 4.0, and I wanted to learn more about Dubai. In my occasional flights to and fro India, I often have a brief layover in Dubai, Doha and other exotic places, but have never ventured beyond the airports. After reading this book I’m thinking “good decision”.There is plenty of local flavor in LD; it’s clear the author speaks from personal experiences and observations. There is a lot about the incredible wealth, the towering office buildings, the extravagant malls. But there is also a good deal about local customs, and not only women’s rights in public, but at home as well. Dan also touches on the very stunning demographics of the Dubai residents, including the native birth of clusters of its police force. And the incredible wealth, and the incredible cars, speeds, crashes, jams. And then there’s the seamier side as well, human trafficking for example., a key plot point of LD.Our hero, Sam Keller, is a bit of a rising star at his NYC-based pharmaceutical corporation. He is tasked with accompanying one of the company’s more senior reps on a trip to the Middle East, in large part to keep the gentleman from misbehaving; it is to be a quick trip, a layover of sorts. But Sam is in Dubai for only hours before being pursued by police Lt. Assad for the murder of his companion. Sam is rescued, temporarily by Sharaf, another police officer and opponent of Assad. Sharaf puts Sam up at his home for one night where Sam gets a taste of Dubai home life, but not of Sharaf’s stunningly attractive and capable 25 year old daughter. And he crosses paths with Mama, Amina.The story is well written, fast-paced, well plotted, and has interesting characters; it gave me everything in the way of local color that I was hoping for. It includes a fight to the death atop a tower under construction on the edge of an elevator shaft. And a very good climax and good ending. I will read more of Dan’s works, and will get “The Letter Writer” in the near future, and likely “Safe Houses” and “The Arms Maker of Berlin” afterwords.
    • 4/5
      Not one of Fesperman's better books. It is a quick, enjoyable read, and he does a great job of using Dubai as a character, but it is rather superficial story (with some wildly implausible parts).
    • 3/5
      This story is set in Dubai, a land of huge wealth and a real estate bubble about to burst. It shows corruption and collusion between large corporations, the global mafia and officials on the take. The story itself is a pretty humdrum thriller. The setting is fascinating. I have to assume that the kinds of activities described actually occur.
    • 4/5
      "Layover in Dubai" took me to a place I've never been - the Persian Gulf Emirate of Dubai, with its ostentatious building programs, conspicuous consumption, and private flouting of Sharia; the exploitation of foreign workers building the new Dubai; its poverty, strivers, and corruption; the conflict between citified Emeraties and Bedouins; the miles and miles of miles and miles. The protagonists are an honest (more or less) police inspector and an American accountant for an multinational American pharmaceutical company who get caught up in a Russian-operated, American-backed white slavery ring. but, this is really the story of two women. Nanette Weaver, security chief for the pharmaceutical firm, dealing with and reacting to the limitations on women in a man's business world; and Laleh, the daughter of an Emerati police inspector, an independent young entrepreneur, chafing against the restrictions placed upon her not only by her protective father but also a conservative society's view of a woman's role. I'd read and enjoyed author Dan Fesperman's "The Arms Maker of Berlin," and this novel as well. Time to dig into more of his backlist.
    • 5/5
      Magnificent thriller! Interesting story line with terriffic characters... and all the action takes place in a location we don't read about too much... Dubai The location adds a very fresh outlook on a murder investigation by a local 'old school' detective who has to deal with social issues of the west that affect not only the investigation, but he relationship with his headstrong daughter that forces him to deal with modern society and leave his outdated traditions behind. Easy read, I finished the book quickly and will look to find other works by the same author!
    • 3/5
      A business man is killed, and his colleague is left holding the bag