A Harvest of Thorns - Couverture souple

A beloved American corporation with an explosive secret. A disgraced former journalist looking for redemption. A corporate executive with nothing left to lose.

In Dhaka, Bangladesh, a garment factory burns to the ground, claiming the lives of hundreds of workers, mostly young women. Amid the rubble, a bystander captures a heart-stopping image-a teenage girl lying in the dirt, her body broken by a multi-story fall, and over her mouth a mask of fabric bearing the label of one of America's largest retailers, Presto Omnishops Corporation. When the photo goes viral, it fans the flames of a decades old controversy about sweatshops, labor rights, and the ethics of globalization.

A year later, in Washington, D.C., Joshua Griswold, a disgraced former journalist for the Washington Post, receives an anonymous summons from a corporate whistleblower promising information about Presto. There, to Griswold's astonishment, he meets Cameron Alexander, Presto's long-time general counsel. Alexander, who has secrets of his own, offers Griswold confidential information about Presto's apparel supply chain.

For Griswold, the challenge of exposing Presto's willful negligence is irresistible, as is the chance, however slight, at redemption. Deploying his old journalistic skills, he builds a historic case against Presto, setting the stage for a war in the courtroom and in the media that Griswold is determined to win-both to salvage his reputation and to provoke a revolution of conscience in Presto's boardroom that could change the course of the fashion industry across the globe.

In Dhaka, Bangladesh, a garment factory burns to the ground, claiming the lives of hundreds of workers. Amid the rubble, a bystander captures a heart-stopping image—a teenage girl lying in the dirt, her body broken by a multistory fall, and over her mouth a mask bearing the label of one of America’s largest retailers, Presto Omnishops Corporation.

At Presto’s headquarters in Virginia, Cameron Alexander, the company’s longtime head lawyer, watches the media coverage of the fire in horror. As a decades-old controversy about sweatshops,  labor rights, and the ethics of globalization reignites, he launches an investigation into the disaster that will reach farther than he could ever imagine—and threaten everything he has left in the world.

A year later, in Washington, DC, disgraced former journalist Joshua Griswold receives an anonymous summons from a whistleblower promising information about Presto and the fire.

For Griswold, the challenge of exposing Presto’s culpability is irresistible. Deploying his old journalistic skills, he builds a historic case against Presto, setting the stage for a war in the courtroom and in the media that he is determined to win—both to salvage his reputation and to provoke a revolution of conscience that could change the fashion industry across the globe.