Cold Caller

If Jim Thompson had gotten an MBA, he might have written Cold Caller, a ravingly readable story of a downwardly mobile yuppie who'll just kill to get ahead. Once a rising VP at a topflight ad agency, Bill Moss now works as a "cold caller" at a telemarketing firm in the Times Square area. He's got a bad case of the urban blues, and when a pink slip rather than promotion comes through, Bill snaps... Now he's got a dead supervisor on his hands and problems no career counsellor can help him with.Jason Starr has retooled the James M. Cain novel of cynical suspense and murder for the fiber-optic age.