Brad Shade Thriller Series

Corruption runs deep in the third installment of the Brad Shade thrillers, the series that inspired the hit Global TV show Private Eyes.

     When Brad Shade arrives in Russia, he knows exactly what to expect.  As a former journeyman turned Scouting Director for Los Angeles, Shade is accustomed to delays at the world’s worst airport, run-ins with Vlad Dubinin, once his rival, now his Moscow scout, and the perpetual headache of getting draft picks released from the KHL.
     But this trip starts off with a catastrophic bang: one player collapses suddenly mid-game, L.A.’s top prospect is missing, and a fatal explosion leaves deals dashed and the league reeling. Forced to contend with violent interference from the FSB, Shade becomes increasingly aware that what looks like a series of unrelated disasters may be something far more sinister.
     And when everything points to deception within his own organization, Shade realizes yet again that the game played off the ice is just as dangerous—and far more deadly—than the game played on it.

Hatred, blackmail, and murder—a Brad Shade hat trick. The Black Ace reunites us with our favourite, savvy fourth-liner, with plot twists, wisecracks, and an ending that could only come from G.B. Joyce. Thanks to Shade’s work at the NHL draft last season, he gets to hold on to his job as scout for L.A.—at least for now. But a journeyman’s work is never done. Shade is checking out the talent in Regina with his old friend and teammate “Chief.” But when they learn of the suicide of an old teammate from their playing days in L.A., they take a sometimes violent detour through the dark side of a small town with no shortage of secrets it wants kept at almost any cost.

Brad Shade has been just about everywhere hockey is played. He has ridden the buses in the minors, shared dressing rooms with the legends of the game, closed bars with guys destined for the Hall of Fame, and dropped the gloves with journeymen like himself who’ll never get near it. Now that he’s retired after fourteen years of bouncing around the league, he’s living out of a suitcase and scouting for Los Angeles, where someone in management owes him a favour from his playing days.
But when the brutally murdered body of coaching legend Red Hanratty turns up in the parking lot after an old-timers charity game, Shade’s job of scouting the local phenomenon starts to overlap with investigating the killing of the kid’s grizzled old coach.
From small-town rinks to the draft tables in the big league, G.B. Joyce introduces us to a character with a self-deprecating sense of humour and an oversized will to win—and weaves a story out of strands of resentment, greed, and fear that span generations and build to a surprising, thrilling conclusion.