Hope Rises (2026) is a thriller by the bestselling American author David Baldacci. The novel is the second installment in the Walter Nash series, following Nash Falls. Baldacci is a prolific writer known for his numerous character-driven thriller series, many of which have become global bestsellers. In Hope Rises, former business executive Walter Nash continues his deep undercover work for the FBI. Now living as the hardened security expert Dillon Hope, Nash is blackmailed by the ruthless head of a global criminal empire, Victoria Steers, into undertaking a perilous mission to rescue her mother from a private prison in Myanmar. This operation forces Nash deeper into a world of espionage, betrayal, and violence, challenging his sense of identity and his belief in justice.

The novel explores complex psychological and moral themes through Nash’s dangerous mission. His transformation into a lethal operative examines The Morally Corrosive Nature of Vengeance as his quest requires him to adopt the ruthless tactics of the world he seeks to dismantle. The complex power dynamics among Steers, her manipulative mother, and a shadowy network of global figures illustrate The Illusion of Absolute Power, demonstrating how even the most calculated players are vulnerable to human fallibility and betrayal. Furthermore, the narrative examines The Burden of Family Ambition, portraying the destructive legacies passed down through generations, particularly through the toxic relationships between Victoria and her mother, Masuyo, and between Nash’s former employer Rhett Temple and Temple’s father, Barton.

This guide refers to the 2026 Grand Central Publishing hardcover edition.

Content Warning: The source text and this guide contain depictions of cursing, graphic violence, sexual content, substance use, addiction, physical abuse, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, child abuse, child death, mental illness, suicidal ideation, death by suicide, and death.

Plot Summary

Walter Nash was a business executive who became an FBI informant. When his daughter, Maggie, disappeared, he believed that she was murdered and began working undercover to avenge her. Nash, transformed into the muscled, tattooed personal security expert Dillon Hope, accompanies his former boss, Rhett Temple, on a private jet to Hong Kong. Unbeknownst to Temple, Nash’s mission is to dismantle the global criminal empire of Victoria Steers, whom he believes is responsible for Maggie’s death. Temple, whose company Sybaritic Investments is a front for Steers, warns Nash of her ruthlessness. 

Nash and Temple meet Steers in her penthouse, where she expresses fury at Temple for bringing an outsider into their circle. To demonstrate her power and gain leverage over the two men, Steers appears to kill a woman named Lynn Ryder with Nash’s gun. She then blackmails Nash and Temple: They must rescue her mother, Masuyo Steers, from a private prison in Myanmar, or she will provide Chinese authorities with evidence implicating them in Ryder’s murder.

Forced into the mission, Nash and Temple travel to Myanmar via a clandestine route from India. They are joined by three local guides named Thura, Zeya, and Amrita under the guise that Temple is a businessman scouting for opportunities. Their journey through the mountainous Kachin State turns deadly when Nash kills a soldier from the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) in self-defense, and Zeya is killed in the same skirmish. Fearing repercussions, Amrita attempts to betray Nash and Temple for a reward, but Thura kills her to protect them, proving his loyalty. Reaching Bhamo, Nash discovers that Steers’s plan involves her own team ambushing the ambulance carrying Masuyo, with the intention of leaving Nash and Temple behind as dead or captured scapegoats. Deducing this, Nash crafts a counter-plan. Using a homemade explosive created from stump remover and sugar, he creates a diversion during the ambush and neutralizes Steers’s team. He and Temple successfully rescue Masuyo and deceive a complicit prison guard, making him believe they were the legitimate rescue team. They escape via helicopter and private jet back to Hong Kong.

Back in Steers’s penthouse, Nash fabricates a story that her original team were traitors who planned to kidnap Masuyo for ransom. Seemingly convinced, Steers hires Nash and Thura as personal bodyguards for herself and her mother. A tense power dynamic immediately develops as Masuyo, freed from her supposed imprisonment, begins to reassert her authority over the empire she founded. She demands Nash’s absolute loyalty, placing him in a precarious position between mother and daughter. Meanwhile, Temple is permitted to return to the United States on the condition that he find Walter Nash. During this time, Nash befriends Victoria’s elderly nanny, Hiroko, who reveals that Masuyo is a Chinese agent who cruelly manipulated Victoria into believing she had killed her own siblings in a brutal succession contest when Masuyo was the actual murderer. Furthermore, Victoria’s biological father was a Chinese man, not Masuyo’s English husband, Joseph Steers. The web of deceit deepens when Steers’s own security chief, Hao, attempts to assassinate her. Nash saves her life and is certain that Masuyo is behind the plot. His resolve for revenge against Steers is reignited, however, when he discovers a box in the building’s basement containing Maggie’s belongings.

The characters’ shifting allegiances culminate in a series of confessions. After surviving a suicide attempt, Victoria reveals to Nash that she is secretly working for the American CIA. Her true mission is to bring down a powerful, shadowy figure named Connor Lord, the man who runs the Myanmar prison and is the true mastermind behind the opioid crisis in the United States. She explains she never intended to harm Maggie. Instead, she faked Maggie’s death with the CIA’s help to protect Maggie from Lord, who wanted Nash neutralized as an FBI asset. Her plan is to sell her entire criminal empire to Lord for a dollar, luring him into a position of vulnerability. 

The plot is complicated when Temple uncovers that Dillon Hope is Walter Nash. He blackmails Nash, demanding help to disappear in exchange for his silence. To set a trap for Lord and Masuyo, Nash and Steers must work with Temple. Temple lures Lord and Masuyo to a large warehouse facility near the Mexican border under the pretense of revealing a new, more disruptive business strategy centered on methamphetamine.

At the warehouse, Lord springs his own trap. He reveals he knows about their plan, having surveilled Temple and discovered Steers’s CIA affiliation. When Nash and Steers are captured, Temple appears to betray them to save his own life. In a pre-planned maneuver, Temple “murders” Nash by stabbing him with a retractable knife that sprays fake blood. Goaded by Masuyo and his own ego, Lord then “executes” Victoria with a prop gun loaded with blanks and a blood-pack squib. Just as Masuyo orders her men to kill Temple, a swarm of FBI and CIA agents raids the facility, having recorded the entire confrontation with hidden devices that Lord’s sweeps could not detect. With video evidence of him committing murder, Lord’s legal defenses crumble, and he and Masuyo are arrested. 

In the aftermath, FBI Agent Reed Morris informs Lord that his global network is being dismantled. To protect his family from any future retaliation, Nash maintains the illusion that he is dead, attending his own funeral from afar as his grieving wife, Judith, and now-reunited daughter watch. Steers and Nash later visit Masuyo in a federal prison, where Steers offers her a vial of poison, which she takes. Nash makes a final visit to Temple, who receives a lenient sentence for his cooperation, encouraging him to find redemption. In the end, Nash, still living as Hope, drives to a remote prison to pick up a newly released Victoria, who now goes by Jenny Lee. He has arranged a quiet new life for her, where she can pursue her art and work as a drug counselor, bringing their tumultuous journey to a close with a fragile but tangible sense of hope.