by Ben Fountain
First published 2023
Matt Amaker watches his beachfront scuba business crumble as a military coup topples President Jean-Bertrand Aristide in 1991 Haiti. The American expat faces a brutal new dictatorship and an international embargo that threatens everyone, from street vendors to the elite. Desperate for cash and survival, Matt partners with his best friend Alix Variel, son of a prominent Haitian family, to hunt legendary shipwrecks rumored to hold priceless cargo off Haiti's remote southern coast. Their treasure hunting triggers a chain of disasters. Alix's educated sister Misha discovers that a U.S. humanitarian aid office is actually smuggling weapons. Rookie CIA officer Audrey O'Donnell gets pulled into clandestine work that proves far more dangerous and morally complex than her superiors revealed. As Matt and his partners dive deeper into both the wrecks and Haiti's violent politics, they confront how American power operates in a nation torn apart by greed and bloodshed.
Genres: american-fiction, historical-fiction, adventure, contemporary
Vibes: emotional, fast-paced, thought-provoking
Tropes: enemies-to-lovers, found-family
Setting: Haiti, Southern Coast
Period: 1991
544 pages · Kindle Edition · Flatiron Books
Content warnings: violence