A Family executed...dope-game mastermind turned Harvard Counselor, Dedrick Mercandel, takes revenge as he mentors four young men who become cold-blooded killers...as elusive and hard to catch as "Slippery Glass." Dedrick Mercandel, an African-American male in his mid-40's, clever, extremely intelligent, a successful Lamborghini dealership owner and a student of LIFE. Additionally, he was a devoted father and husband - a quiet, imposing presence who set exceptionally high standards for his four teenage sons. He required their absolute best in everything they did, deliberately setting the example by coming home at the same time every night; taking great care with his grooming and appearance; having "date night" with his wife regularly and diligently imparting knowledge to the young men they were raising. His expertise in drug trafficking was invaluable to the Columbians once every few years, he moved hundreds of millions of dollars in product for them. Mercandel's identity was so carefully concealed that even the supplier who employed him had no idea who he was; but his double life was about to take a 180-degree turn.

Wes Anderson on Stefan Zweig: "I had never heard of Zweig...when I just more or less by chance bought a copy of Beware of Pity. I loved this first book. I also read the The Post-Office Girl. The Grand Budapest Hotel has elements that were sort of stolen from both these books. Two characters in our story are vaguely meant to represent Zweig himself — our “Author” character, played by Tom Wilkinson, and the theoretically fictionalised version of himself, played by Jude Law. But, in fact, M. Gustave, the main character who is played by Ralph Fiennes, is modelled significantly on Zweig as well." "Stefan Zweig was a dark and unorthodox artist; it's good to have him back."--Salman Rushdie The great Austrian writer Stefan Zweig was a master anatomist of the deceitful heart, and Beware of Pity, the only novel he published during his lifetime, uncovers the seed of selfishness within even the finest of feelings. Hofmiller, an Austro-Hungarian cavalry officer stationed at the edge of the empire, is invited to a party at the home of a rich local landowner, a world away from the dreary routine of the barracks. The surroundings are glamorous, wine flows freely, and the exhilarated young Hofmiller asks his host's lovely daughter for a dance, only to discover that sickness has left her painfully crippled. It is a minor blunder that will destroy his life, as pity and guilt gradually implicate him in a well-meaning but tragically wrongheaded plot to restore the unhappy invalid to health.