Edison’s Last Breath by Patrick Kendrick

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As Thomas Edison was dying, he left test tubes of what he believed would be his final breath, until it was. His intent was to leave his “last breath,” for his protégé, friend, and confidant, Henry Ford. But forty-two tubes were lost after he died. Then, year after year, one of the tubes of Edison’s breath would arrive at Ford’s Florida winter home where Ford would open it and breathe in the breath of his dead friend. He thought it brought him strength and wisdom.

Now, in 1940, a tube arrives at Ford’s home, but a man steals it and breathes in its contents, then immediately falls over dead. The man is a rabbi. The package the tube arrived in has the return address of one of the world’s most popular entertainers, Josephine Baker, who lives in France.

Retired Scotland Yard Inspector, Emmet MacWain just wants to live in Key West, fish, drink some rum, and soak in the beauty of the island, away from the fog-shrouded, dark, and murderous streets of London. But, once again, he is coerced by the shady F.B.I. agent, John Serey, into an investigation that will have him clash with one of America’s titans of industry as well as international spies who would see the world crumble under the boots of the Nazi regime.

Now, MacWain must find the answer to a deadly puzzle that leads him to the jungles of Brazil, where their Macumba, or voodoo, practitioners have taken over Fordlandia, Ford’s failed car factory, and MacWain is presented with more questions that, inevitably, land him in war-torn France where a global battle is raging out of control like a firestorm and threatening the entire world.

Year first published: 2024