Terminal Ambition: A Maggie Mahoney Novel [Paperback]

Kate McGuinness (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 24, 2012

In this addictive tale, an avalanche upends the meteoric career of Maggie Mahoney, a high-flying female partner in a prestigious Wall Street law firm. Brilliant and beautiful, she became the trophy wife of its managing attorney. After a torrent of snow kills both her husband and her principal client, Maggie is reduced to being just another powerless female partner at the venerable Sweeny, Owens & Boyle.
 
Obsessed with his dream of becoming the next Attorney General, firm chairman Andy Anderson creates a tangled web of deceit in a desperate gamble to conceal the firm's secrets and the shocking skeleton buried deep in his own closet. Maggie suspects he has a hidden agenda when he appoints Jack Slattery, a former prosecutor unqualified to be managing attorney, to replace her husband. Jack must have something poisonous on Andy, but what is it?
 
Forced to become a sleuth, Maggie stages a break-in to gather evidence. But she's not the only one inside the firm playing detective. Andy will stop at nothing to achieve his ambition and deploys his loyal lieutenant to recruit unknowing partners in breaking all the rules. Suspense builds with breakneck pacing. Rape ups the stakes as the cat and mouse game between Maggie and Andy plays out to its shocking finish.
 
Readers will be totally hooked by this gripping and unusual story that reveals the inner workings of a powerful law firm. McGuinness is a born storyteller who creates three dimensional, complex characters. Their pitch perfect dialogue and motivations ring true. Terminal Ambition holds a mirror up to the excesses and immorality of Wall Street in a manner reminiscent of Tom Wolfe's Bonfire of the Vanities.                

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Kate McGuinness knows all too well the corporate world of go-along-to-get-ahead that so many women face today. In Terminal Ambition, she's crafted a firm as believable... and as slimy... as any created by Turow or Grisham. Read it!" Melanie Rigney, former editor at Writer's Digest magazine

From the Back Cover

 

Praise for TERMINAL AMBITION:
 
"Author Kate McGuinness does a terrific job highlighting the challenges that are all too familiar to women in the working world. An intriguing portrayal of discrimination and harassment, Terminal Ambition is a must read." Susan Estrich Fox News Commentator 
 
"A terrific, smart, honest book. Kate McGuinness knows how to write a suspenseful page-turner." Will Meyerhofer, JD MSW, Author: Way Worse Than Being a Dentist
 
"From its dramatic opening ona mountain top to intriguing scenes inside the walls of a powerful law firm, this page-turner offers readers a wild ride they won't soon forget." Steven J. Harper, Author: The Partnership
 
"Every working woman should read this book! Author Kate McGuinness both entertains and educates, inspires and motivates women and men who work with them to claim the rights that are theirs by law and more. Brilliant, passionate, Terminal Ambition could revolutionize how you think about going to work and what you can do there." Kathleen Barry, Professor Emerita Pennsylvania State University Author: Female Sexual Slavery
 
 "A gritty legal thriller. . . that pivots on the theme of sexual harassment. This page-turner book not only illuminates one of the most persistent and important gender-justice problems of the day but it also raises thorny moral questions that challenge every woman or man who seeks success in the top professions of our society. A must read for lawyers and nonlawyers alike." Roy L. Brooks,  Professor of Law University of San Diego 
 
"The issues addressed in McGuinness' intriguing first novel Terminal Ambition - from acquaintance rape to sexual harassment - are ones that will be all too familiar to her readers. Heroine Maggie Mahoney's courage in challenging the status quo will inspire young women to speak up and take action in their own lives." Abigail Collazo, Editor Fem2pt0
 
"In Maggie Mahoney, McGuinness has created a vivid and engaging protagonist, who possesses grit, integrity and a burning desire for justice. Surely admirable qualities for a lawyer---but they may yet bring about her destruction." Claire McNab, Former President Sisters in Crime
 

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 308 pages
• Publisher: Two XX Press (March 24, 2012)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0984990178
• ISBN-13: 978-0984990177
• Product Dimensions: 0.7 x 5.9 x 8.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (71 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,818,879 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Kate McGuinness practiced law with a major international law firm headquartered in Los Angeles. Her work took her to cities like London, New York and Denver. While the travel may sound glamorous, the pressure of getting big deals done meant long hours in conference rooms smelling left-over lunches and dinners. Kate managed some huge leveraged buyouts and represented banks loaning billions of dollars - yes, that's billions with a a "b." She learned to spot typos very quickly!

A Fortune 300 company recruited Kate to be its general counsel. That job posed an entirely different set of problems. She was responsible for a staff of 16 lawyers working in Los Angeles and New York City. Managing personnel and legal issues proved to be less of an issue than navigating corporate politics where earning per share are everything!

After Kate left the corporate world, she studied creative writing at the University of Southern California and the University of California at Los Angeles. She loved her teachers at UCLA and has no qualms about cheering for the Bruins when they play their cross-town rivals the Trojans.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Got me from page 1 May 28, 2012

By Laren Bright

Format:Paperback

Some books give you a sense of a world that may be foreign to you. Books like Terminal Ambition drag you into such a world and give you the full-immersion experience.

From the first page I was into it and simply didn't want to put it down. And the best part: it wasn't just an entertaining read, it gave me real insights into an issue that, being a man, I would not be able to experience firsthand. This was darn near as good -- or maybe I should say as bad -- as being there.

A really impressive debut and one can only hope the first of many more books to come.

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars And It Grows and Grows...New Series Directed at Women's Rights! October 4, 2012

By Glenda A Bixler VINE™ VOICE

Format:Paperback

It was 1963 when I started working in the Personnel Office. A year later, I became secretary to the Director who was charged with the responsibility of updating, disseminating, and implementing the new employment laws that came into existence in 1964. It had been a very long time since I had read anything about filing with the EEOC, sexual harassment and sexual discrimination...

Yet, here I was reading Terminal Ambition by Kate McGuiness, written as if this was all new "stuff..."

It had started to change around 1985; this author essentially was telling me that the United States was back where it was in the early 1960s. My heart sunk... but I wasn't the least surprised... Because by the time I left work there, I had planned to file my own legal suit...

Maggie Mahoney had worked hard--the extra hours and extra research that had finally won her a partnership. She deserved it and knew it, nor did she think much about the other women in the firm--she had her own career goals and had gotten where she was because she had worked her head off to get there. I commend Kate McGuiness for developing her character this way, because when she began to have a change of heart, it was easy to see she realized how much she had been blind to, or just overlooked because of her own time and career pressures.

She had always known that everybody felt she had made partner by sleeping with one of the partners. But she had loved him and ignored such gossip. But then he was killed in an accident and she soon realized a change when she went back to work--a change in the way she was treated.

At the same time, word was going around every place that a large law firm was going to be investigated by the EEOC...

So in response, an internal self-review was to start. Maggie was named as one of the members of that group. Do I dare say that she was dumb (or naive) enough to think that the committee was a good thing and would be of great help?

What she found instead was just the opposite...

Readers may think that the novel is overkill--that too many different examples of discrimination were included. In fact, this book has more sexual issues than an erotic novel...LOL

The key thing that these sexual issues were about harassment and discrimination. The example I enjoyed most was when clients were going to be entertained by the in house staff. The female attorneys or associates were excluded because they routinely took their clients to strip clubs. The involved females were told that the clients would feel uncomfortable participating in the "services" if their female lawyers were present. Ahhh, the sexual fun has soooo evolved... [sarcasm intended]

Maggie was astounded when she heard this, and especially amazed that up to $100,000 may be spent in just one night!

You see, somewhere around the 80s and 90s, the desire for macho power rose again, and simply eliminated all that had been accomplished in the 60s and 70s. Many readers will read this book and exclaim it is revolutionary, illuminating, and will help you "think about going to work and what you can do there..." What I will say bluntly is that if you have faced any form of sexual harassment or sexual discrimination as illustrated in Terminal Ambition, run, don't walk, to the nearest phone and call the EEOC. Alternatively, check out Kate's site, on women's rights. My own lawyer explained that my own case had gone on so long and was so encompassing that I could not afford to pay her to sufficiently study all the materials in order to represent me. Don't let your own situation continue if there is one... Seek help!

Kudos to Kate McGuinness for starting this series. And for her becoming a full-time advocate for Women's Rights. I consider this a must-read for every women now working...

GABixlerReviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Great read for lawyers and non-lawyers alike! October 9, 2012

By L.F.B.

Format:Paperback

I picked up this book this weekend and read it quickly, because I enjoyed it so much! I really liked getting to know Maggie Mahoney and I look forward to other books with her as the lead character.

The subject of this book (the sexual harassment and discrimination that, unfortunately, still does exist in the legal profession) is one that needs to be talked about by attorneys and non-attorneys. Kate McGuiness uses her ability to tell a compelling story to create a dialogue around how women are at times treated in the legal profession.

I recommend this book as a fun read, but one that also makes you think and consider the themes underlying the story line.