Tom Coho is a veteran of the Forever Wars, a hardened operator with a distinct skillset, mostly involving the ability to rain fury on any foe. What’s more, he’s found a solid crew, a band of brothers trusted in battle, bonds forged in the fires of combat.

Unfortunately he and his crew also lack a set of skills: the ones that might allow them to put the guns down and leave normal lives, to love their wives and settle in to peaceful domesticity—tending the home fires, and all that. And even operators need a steady paycheck. So they’ve farmed their talents out south of the border, to a cartel leader named Don Maria who’s paying them well for doing what they love. Unfortunately dirty money comes with moral debts. And sooner or later all debts come due…

Brian Castner’s The Long Walk offered a stunning firsthand account of the horrible spectacle of modern war, and its aftermath—the dazzling catastrophes that sear the mind, the ones that participants can’t quite leave behind. Now he’s written a novel looking at the ugly consequences of that: the men who dug themselves deeper into a lifestyle they didn’t have the moral courage to leave—one that’s filthy but lucrative, one that might give them everything they want, but cost more than they can bear. It’s a lean and literary look at the dark side of our national fetishization of money and power, a modern Western, and a rip-roaring ridealong with men who can fight their way through hell, but might not be able to leave when they’re done. Join us on the ride.