Danny Tyler spent four years trying to be normal. Four years in Maryland, away from his father's criminal world, engaged to a woman who believed people could change. Four years pretending he wasn't Tommy Tyler's son.
One phone call from his brother Randy changes everything.
Back in Florida, Danny discovers his family has evolved beyond the drug trade that drove him away. They're running synthetic identity fraud… creating ghost people from the Social Security numbers of the recently deceased, exploiting the gaps in America's financial systems. It's sophisticated. It's lucrative. And it needs Danny's specific skills: his ability to see patterns, manipulate databases, and build systems that make the impossible look legitimate.
The money is intoxicating. Twenty-five thousand dollars a week. More than he made in six months at his straight job. But money isn't freedom, it's just a more expensive cage.
When the FBI raids the operation, Danny thinks it's over. His father dies in custody under suspicious circumstances. His brothers are arrested. The life he built and the life he escaped have both collapsed.
Then Adam Freeman, a man Danny has known since childhood, makes an offer: work for the CIA, or watch your brothers go to prison.
And Laura, the woman Danny fell for, reveals she's been his handler all along. Their relationship is real. But it started as an assignment. Now they're both trapped in a game neither of them chose, playing roles for people who think they own them.
But Danny Tyler has spent his entire life learning how systems work. How to find the gaps. How to exploit the space between what's supposed to happen and what actually happens. The CIA thinks they've recruited a useful criminal.
They've actually recruited a ghost who's been building escape routes since he was sixteen years old.
SYNTHETIC IDENTITY is a noir crime thriller about a man who discovers that the only way to be free is to make everyone believe they control you. It's the first book in the Tyler Network Series… a story of criminals with codes, handlers who become partners, and the thin line between being owned and owning yourself.
For readers who love the moral complexity of Breaking Bad, the criminal sophistication of Catch Me If You Can, and the shadow-world intrigue of Homeland.
