After (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9781966074267)

Afflicted with terminal cancer, billionaire Mark Long has mere months to live. Fixated on what comes after, Long anonymously offers a $5 billion prize to anyone who can prove to his satisfaction that there is some kind of life after death. The contest is quickly whittled down to three finalists. Professor Megan Finlay, chair of the Holmes Parapsychology Institute at the University of Edinburgh, is close to a breakthrough. She specializes in near-death experiences and winning Long's multibillion-dollar prize is a necessity.The funding for the financially troubled institute ends in a matter of months. If the institute closes, Finlay's entire life's work will be all but forgotten. Another finalist is Aidan McKnight, former Navy SEAL and head of Acheron Capital Partners, who is addicted to challenges. When he hears about Long's contest, he finds Hundra Benteen, a beautiful Montana-based "sensitive" who-in an industry filled with scammers, frauds, and charlatans-just may be the real thing. When McKnight meets Benteen, she turns his world upside down by knowing intimate information about his father, a SEAL who disappeared during a botched 1983 mission in Grenada. Can Benteen communicate with the spirit of McKnight's father and pass along any critical information? The last finalist, the Swiss National Institute for Paranormal Studies, doesn't exist and is a front for Maxim Azimov, the world's most notorious cybercriminal and mastermind of Al Deepfake technology. As Long's battle with cancer draws to its inevitable end, Azimov plots to permanently eliminate each of his competitors and win the $5 billion prize fraudulently using Deepfake.

"Ashby's latest is a page-turning supernatural thriller that explores humankind's oldest question: 'Is there life after death?!" "A profoundly moving read that will stay with thriller aficionados long after they finish the novel." -Kirkus Reviews -

"Best Books of 2024"

"What a page turner! After has a simple but sensational plot, refreshingly free from clichés. The novel has characters we care about, and telling details ... but they're only a small part of AFTER'S much deeper and more mysterious story. I couldn't put the book down." -Mark Weston, author of The Runner-Up Presidency, The Elections That Defied America's Popular Will

"A truly great supernatural thriller. AFTER has all the right ingredients for the next Hollywood blockbuster. Read this book now so that you too can tell your friends "I told you so! "when the movie rights get snapped up." -Staton Rabin, screenwriter and novelist (Betsy and the Emperor, etc.)