The Trust by Norb Vonnegut

One sultry morning in Charleston, South Carolina, real estate magnate Palmer Kincaid’s body washes ashore, the apparent victim of accidental drowning. Palmer’s daughter calls Grove O’Rourke, stockbroker and hero of Top Producer, for help getting her family’s affairs in order. Palmer was Grove’s mentor and client, the guy who opened doors to a world beyond Charleston. Grove steps in as the interim head of the Palmetto Foundation, an organization Palmer created to encourage philanthropy.

Community foundations, like the Palmetto Foundation, are conduits. Philanthropists gift money to them and propose the ultimate beneficiaries. But in exchange for miscellaneous benefits—anonymity, investment services, and favorable tax treatment—donors lose absolute control. Once funds arrive, community foundations can do whatever they decide.

For years Palmer showed great sensitivity to his donors, honoring their wishes to funnel funds into the charities of their choice—his unspoken pledge—and it was this largesse which made him a respected pillar of the Charleston community. But after Grove authorizes a $25 million transfer requested by a priest from the Catholic Fund, he discovers something is terribly wrong. He gets a call from Biscuit Hughes, a lawyer representing the people of Fayetteville, North Carolina, against a new sex superstore in their town. Biscuit has traced the store’s funding to a most unlikely source: the Catholic Fund.

Together, Grove and Biscuit launch an investigation into the fund, but the deeper they dig, the more evidence they find that the fund’s money isn’t being used to support the impoverished—it’s going somewhere much more sinister. When someone close to him disappears and the FBI starts breathing down his neck, Grove knows he has to figure out who’s pulling all the strings before the shadowy figure who will stop at nothing to keep the fund a secret gets to him.

*****

“THE TRUST is a fast fun, totally engrossing thriller that hooked me on page one and never let go. Vonnegut knows the financial world inside and out, and his expertise raised this excellent story to the highest level. The Trust is a winner from start to finish. I loved it.” – Christopher Reich

“Norb Vonnegut is the Nelson DeMille of finance thrillers. Traveling with his characters and getting the inside skinny on the brokerage business is a must for all fiction lovers!” – Alexandra Lebenthal

*****

“When money talks, I listen,” says NORB VONNEGUT. He is the author of three financial thrillers including THE GODS OF GREENWICH, which the NYT calls, “A gleeful peek at the world of hedge fund moguls.” Stephen Frey says THE TRUST (available July 2012) “reels you in fast…then goes like lightning.” Norb is published in eight languages and has appeared on Bloomberg as well as the Dylan Ratigan, Judith Regan, and Laura Ingraham shows. A Harvard graduate with two decades on Wall Street, Vonnegut is working on his first non-fiction book. He splits his time between New York City and Rhode Island and is a Trustee for the American Foundation for the Blind. LIKE Norb Vonnegut Books on Facebook and visit his website.