The Family Trade (Merchant Princes 1) by Stross, Charles - 2007

Tor, 2007. Paperback. Good. Miriam Beckstein, a successful reporter for a hi-tech magazine in Boston, f inds iron-clad evidence of a money-laundering scheme. But when she takes it to her editor, she's fired on the spot and gets a death threat from the cr iminals she has uncovered. Before the day is over, she's received a locket left by the mother she neve r knew - the mother who was murdered when she was an infant. Within is a kn ot work pattern, which has a hypnotic effect on her. Before she knows it, s he's transported herself to a parallel Earth, a world where knights on hors eback chase their prey with automatic weapons, and where world-skipping ass assins lurk just on the other side of reality - a world where her true fami ly runs things. 'Fast, funny, busily inventive . . . [Stross] is the creme de la creme' Loc us 'Science fiction is in good hands with Charles Stross here to lead the new generation' Orson Scott Card.