24 Hours: A Suspense Thriller - Softcover

Iles, Greg

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0451203593 ISBN 13: 9780451203595

Publisher: Penguin, 2001

Synopsis

#1 New York Times bestselling author Greg Iles takes readers on a daringly executed roller-coaster ride as a family under attack takes justice into their own hands.

It begins on a perfect night, with a perfect family about to be trapped in a perfect crime...

Will Jennings is a successful young doctor in Jackson, Mississippi, with a thriving practice, a beautiful wife, and a five-year-old daughter he loves beyond measure. But Will and his family are being watched by a con man and psychopath who may be a genius. A man who has never been caught and whose victims have never talked to the police. A man whose life's work strikes at the heart of every family's unspoken fear: the unstoppable kidnapping.

But this time he's picked the wrong family to terrorize. Because Will and Karen Jennings aren't going to watch helplessly as he victimizes them. They aren't going to let him get away with it. They're going to fight back...

About this title

Review:

Greg Iles's explosive suspense thriller 24 Hours gets off to a blistering start: the kidnapping of a little boy--in eight breathless pages--that culminates with the child's safe return and the disappearance of the successful kidnappers. That sets the stage for the book's centrepiece, the abduction of little Abby Jennings, daughter of Will, a successful physician and Karen, a slightly dissatisfied suburban woman who's wondering where the passion in her marriage went. The criminals' modus operandi is established early on. They target the progeny of Mississippi doctors, demand a reasonable (to an affluent MD) ransom, release the child after the money's been paid and promise the victim's parents that if they ever breathe a word of the incident to anyone, their child will be taken again and killed. The kidnappings are carefully set up, targeted to take place when one parent is out of town at a medical meeting or convention, thus ensuring the cooperation of the other. And the victim is held by a sweet, slightly retarded but humongous and powerful man whose loyalty to his cousin, the mastermind, is unquestioned.

24 Hours is a version of the locked room school of kidnap mysteries and a very good one indeed, especially when Will turns the tables on the kidnapper and takes control of the situation. Abby's diabetic condition (she needs lifesaving injections on a regular basis) notches the suspense up one last turn. It's a well worked-out plot, the pacing is terrific and the characters likeable and attractive. Iles is a master storyteller and this one has big screen written all over it--with Harrison Ford and Michelle Pfeiffer as the Jennings, if we're lucky. --Jane Adams

Review:

"Brilliantly plotted...perfectly-timed terror...and a hair-raising finale."--Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"Iles displays all the well-honed chops that have made him a bestselling author...He Achieves a near perfect balance of high-tech inventiveness and characterization as the plot rushes to its grand--and violent--finale....Inventive and fast-paced."--Times-Picayune

"A chilling tale...calculated to jangle the reader's every nerve...gut-wrenching."--Library Journal

"A taut tale, terrifying in its intensity, compelling in its pace...A good, old-fashioned thriller, the likes of which are rare...A winner."--Chattanooga Times

About this edition

• Publisher: Penguin
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 0451203593
• ISBN 13: 9780451203595
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• Number of pages: 452