Payback is a novel about one of the most compelling and powerful motivators of the human race, Revenge: The son of a powerful and wealthy banker in Mexico City is arrested for a suspicious smuggling of cocaine found in his suitcase when he arrives at Bush International Airport. Since the beginning the author creates suspense by hinting that this arrest sounds suspicious, more like a setup than anything else.Don Jose, the grandfather of Manolo "the defendant", hires Roberto Duran, a prominent and successful attorney, to defend his grandson. While trying to gather evidence to support his case, Duran gets embroiled in the dangerous world of drug trafficking and the powerful and fascinating minds of the underworld. The book hooks you from the start with vivid descriptions of the powerful, whether they may be masterminds or executors of the revenge. Like many good mysteries, many answers to questions are not readily answered, but hinted. This catapults the novel forwards, creating in the reader an urge of wanting to know more.Ramon del Villar, a master of specificity, and suspense, engages us since the outset by elegantly and well-crafted depictions of three dimensional characters, whose dark and lighter side coexist simultaneously. For all those wanting to know more about how the legal system works in the United States, the novel is in its own way a formidable guide of all the path of a civil procedure, narrated in a thrilling way.
