Shooting Star: Roman - Softcover

Temple, Peter

Softcover

ISBN 10: 3442471400 ISBN 13: 9783442471409

Publisher: Goldmann Verlag, 2010

Synopsis

Anne Carson: fifteen, beautiful, wayward. Abducted. Her rich family has closed ranks and summoned Frank Calder, ex-soldier and sacked police hostage negotiator. They want him to deliver the ransom money to the kidnappers. Frank wants them to call in the law, but the family refuses, since police bungling nearly cost the life of another Carson child kidnapped years before. But are the two kidnappings connected? And is greed the motivation? Revenge? Or could it be something else? To find out, Frank Calder must go beyond his brief. As Frank feverishly searches for suspects in the web of Carson family businesses and deals, marriages and indiscretions, rivalries and intrigues, he knows that if his instincts are wrong, the girl will surely die.

About this title

Review:

It's always good to be the first person to discover talent -- and despite his immense success in Australia (he is that country's pre-eminent crime writer), Peter Temple has been something of hidden treasure for British and American readers. But Temple's days as a hidden treasure are disappearing, as more and more readers discover just how distinctive a writer he is (crime celebrity admirers include Val McDermid and Mark Billingham).

Temple (who won the 2007 Crime Writers’ Association Dagger with The Broken Shore) has, in Shooting Star, another winner. Prickly, fifteen-year-old Anne Carson is abducted -- to the horror of her well-heeled family. Disgraced police negotiator Frank Calder is commissioned to pay the ransom, but he has other ideas – there was another child kidnapping some years before, and Frank is convinced there is a connection. But the death of Anne Carson may be imminent.

All the things that make Peter Temple's books such pleasurable experiences are here: the steady, satisfying unravelling of a mystery, the gallery of idiosyncratic characters (notably the dogged -- and beleaguered -- Frank Calder). But the prime Temple virtue -- sheer storytelling acumen -- is what makes Shooting Star such a success. --Barry Forshaw

Review:

'No summary or catalogue of details will do it justice. Read it for the writing and for where it says this sort of novel is today.'
Age

'If you have not read a Temple thriller, you don't know what you are missing.'
Adelaide Advertiser

'A tough, contemporary crime novel that takes the reader down some very mean Australian streets...A terrific read by one of Australia's best crime novelists.'
Canberra Times

'Temple's dialogue is crisp and the narrative at times poetic...a tense unputdownable thriller with full-throated characters and dynamite plot.'
Castlemaine Mail

'Peter Temple is, quite simply, the finest crime writer we have and Shooting Star reminds us why and how he has set a standard internationally that few come near. His Chandler-like ability to capture the dark corners of our sunniest places is as good as it gets. Temple weaves past and present beautifully ...a terrific and powerful read.'
Hobart Mercury

'As always, Temple is a master of the complex plot and his characters leap from the page fully realised in a taut, action-packed thriller.'
Telegraph UK

About this edition

• Publisher: Goldmann Verlag
• Publication date: 2010
• ISBN 10: 3442471400
• ISBN 13: 9783442471409
• Binding: Paperback