Not A Penny More Not A Penny Less By Jeffrey Archer

First novel written by world-famous writer Jeffery Archer. It is based on a true experience in his own life. He invested 10 lakh dollars in a Canadian Company. Later he came to know that the company was bogus and that he had lost all his money. He become bankrupt and had to resign from position as Member of the British Parliament. Instead of mourning over his loss, he wrote a novel based on the incident and it became a Best-seller! Today, Jefferey Archer is one of the world`s best known writers.The gist of the story - The novel`s main character is Harvey Metcalf, son of a Polish refugee. He grows up in New York and as he struggles to earn money, he becomes a very crafty, wily, dishonest person, ready to commit any fraud to become rich. He has no regard for ethical business practices, earns a lot of money by all sorts of tricks and foul mehtods in New York Stock Exchange and becomes rich. At a late age, he marries and gets a beautiful daugher who is everything in the world to him. As time goes by, he develops tastes for expensive hobbies. He starts liking paintings by great artistcs and collects them, he loves orchids and makes a garden of the most exotic orchids. His third hobby is buying race horses and attending races in great style. Fourth hobby is to watch Centre Court Wimbledon tennis matches. However, his habit of doing unethical business continues. He floats an oil prospecting company in England, registered in Canada, employs David Keskar, a fresh bright Harvard Business Graduate as a manager of the company. This David Keslar has no experience, is not very bright but is very hard-working and keen to show results on his first job. His friend from Harvard - Stephen Bradley, is teaching in Oxford, whom he meets for dinner. Stephen has recently inherited a lot of money and is wondering where to invest it. He decides to invest 2,50,000 dollars in Prospecoil - David’s company. David goes for a check-up to Harvey street to Doctor Adrian Trylet who is bored of his Harvey street practice. When he hears about Prospecta Oil from David he decides to put 3, 50, 000 dollars in the company. David wants to buy a good painting for his company given flat in London. So he goes to the art-gallery of Jean Piere Lamons - A Frenchman. David tells about Prospecta Oil to him also, and Piere Lamons decides to buy shares worth 2, 50, 000- dollars with the object of selling them when the price goes up. David goes with his boss to a famous night club and meets Lord James Brigsly. When David tells him about Prospecta Oil, he is also tempted to invest money in Prospecta Oil. He knows his father would not approve of his venture, so he mortagages his huge land and gets a loan from a bank to invest 3,50,000 dollars. Harvey had purchased shares not in his name, but different names, he sells them all and makes 70 lakh dollars, his name has not appeared in any of the transactions, there is no evidence connecting him to the company. All people who had bought the shares, become bankrupt overnight. David Kasler has lost his job and the money he invested himself. Totally ruined, he runs away to America. The four people who have suffered the most, are Stephen Bradley, Jean Piere Lamons, Adrian Tryler and James Brigsley. Stephen manages to find out who is behind the fraud, learns that it is Harvey Metcalf, gets as much information as possible about him, then finds out about the other three major losers, calls them over to Oxford and together they decide on a complicated plan to get every penny of their money back. The whole story becomes more intriguing because James has fallen in love with a model Anne Summerton. He does not know that she has taken this name in England but is actually Metcalf`s daughter, nor does she know that it is her father who has duped James and his friends!How their complicated plans develop and how they get all their money back makes an extremely interesting, amusing, often hilarious story till the end, when Anne Summerton alias Rosalie Metcalf weds James Brigsley in a grand wedding ceremony in America at Metcalf`s palatial house.Jeffery Archer continues writing engrossing suspense stories and novels, but "Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less` still remains an all time favourite of his readers all over the world.