Derailed

Rating:
Summary: Buy it now!!!
Review: James Seigel is the new "king of the pageturner"!!! With DERAILED he cast a spell on me that wasn't broken until hours after I'd finished the book. The novel's clean, smart prose introduces Charles Schine, a married middle-aged corporate everyman leading a comfortably dull life and tosses him into a set of circumstances that test his courage, imagination and humanity in ways that are as startling as they are compelling. Siegel has not written one of those cardboard cut-out crime novels featuring a larger than life detective or spy who's impossible to kill. He's done something much more challenging --and rewarding to the reader: he's taken a set of circumstances that could confront anyone and turned them into a narrative that's as credible and exciting as any you're likely to read this year. DERAILED is a "must" for every reader attracted to the best in suspense. It was a real joy to discover.

Rating:
Summary: exhilarating thriller
Review: Life is quite predictable for Charles Schine. Every weekday he catches the 8:43 train leaving Babylon, Long Island for Manhattan where he works as an advertiser. At home and at work Charles bored as he feels choked by the needs of his wife and his diabetic daughter, and the demands of his job. With his wife off to her job, the impossible occurs as Charles misses his commute due to his daughter's last second needs. He catches the 9:05, but that twenty-two minutes changes his life as he meets the also married Lucinda.

Charles now rides the 9:05 as he harmlessly flirts with Lucinda. This leads to a hotel rendezvous, but his first affair goes astray when an armed man breaks into his room, beats up Charles, and rapes Lucinda. His spiral into hell spins further out of control when someone tries to blackmail Charles, but instead of paying the fee, he hires a thug. His effort to return to suburban normalcy only sends Charles deeper into the quagmire with his life rapidly falling apart.

DERAILED is an exhilarating thriller, as the numerous woes (much self-inflicted) that pile on Charles would exacerbate Job and maybe some readers. Charles starts out as a sympathetic character, but his irresponsible actions to cover the hole he dug will change the reactions of the audience towards him, the accomplishment of the novel. James Siegel paints quite a picture of a person making one judgment error out of the need of having something joyous in his life that leads to a series of calamities and a powerful action packed character study for fans.

Harriet Klausner

Rating:
Summary: An Amazing Thriller!!!!!!!!!
Review: I was extremely fortunate to get my hands on an advance copy of DERAILED from a friend who runs a bookstore. She gave it to me saying, "this is the best thriller I've read in years," which is high praise indeed, as she is acknowledged as our city's most discriminating and knowledgeable reader of suspense fiction. Her recommendations are gospel around here. Fortunately, DERAILED is as good as her word. From the first chapter, when we are hurled into the main character's dilemma, the book produces a powerful magnetic force that kept me riveted to its pages for the day that it took me to read it. Siegel's storytelling is masterful and his writing style is mesmerizing. This is the thriller that I will be recommending to *everyone* for months to come.

Rating:
Summary: A major talent!
Review: James Siegel's novel DERAILED is a breathtaking thriller.
What starts out as a story of a simple flirtation on a commuter train between two adults, turns into a nightmare of deception, blackmail and murder. After a midmorning tryst in a seedy hotel, Charles Schine and Lucinda Harris are robbed, beaten and Lucinda is brutally raped.
What follows is a complex examination of the human condition with enough twists and turns to keep the reader guessing until the very end.

Cleverly crafted and very well written, James Siegel is a major talent and DERAILED is a book that should not be missed.

Rating:
Summary: Suspenseful listening
Review: Charles Schine is an ad-man who seemingly has everything, a loving wife and a teen-diabetic daughter who "makes" him late one morning, so he doesn't take his usual train, but one later. There he meets a beautiful woman and makes one bad choice after the other.
In the first third James Siegel mixes first- and third-person narration and the listener soon finds out that not everything is the way he/she thought it would be. The plot makes some more unexpected twists and turns that keep the listener, well, listening.
What adds to the suspense is that Gregory Harrison as the narrator does a terrific job. He captivates the listener and makes them "feel" with the characters. He especially does a great job with Charles'"inner monologues" and when Charles comments things around him just for himself.
I haven't read the first book by James Siegel, but I will now.

Rating:
Summary: Fast and Fun, Nothing Groundbreaking
Review: Every once and a while a book by a debut author comes out with a lot of buzz. The publishing companies put a lot into pushing it. Big name authors names are tied to it through endorsements and comparisons. Often times this buzz is created because the book is a new and unique offering, something really special. Unfortunately more often than not the buzz is manufactured by a media savvy author. Derailed by James Siegel fits more into the second category.

Not that Derailed is a bad book, it just doesn't in my opinion live up to the hype. The plot is definitely intriguing. A Charles Schine, a normal man in an unsatisfactory marriage and burdened with a sick daughter meets a beautiful and mysterious women on the train. A women amazingly attracted to Charles. Of course one thing leads to another and now Charles life is turned upside down.

The problem with Derailed is not in its style or execution. The story moves along at a nice pace and is easy to read. The main problem is that is relies a lot on tricks and switching perspectives to get most of its surprises. The twists and turns are about as shocking as a drive down the New Jersey Turnpike, you see them coming from a long way away, yet you still look forward to them.

There is a lot of good in this book. Charles Schine is a likable character, stuck in a bad situation, mostly due to his own imperfections. The author uses the age old theme of not knowing what you got until it's gone. Charles after his life has been destroyed is a lot more likable a guy than before and his family members really don't develop until late in the book when having to deal with his indiscretions.

So if you're looking for a light, fast moving fun read in the mold of James Patterson or Harlen Coben, Derailed is a good choice. Just don't expect anything groundbreaking.

Rating:
Summary: Disappointing
Review: I was interested in this book since I read the flap on the hardcover. I was pleased when I saw it in paperback and picked it up. First off, from the beginning the dialogue is really bad. The flirting between the main character and the woman is really trite. The worst part of the book is halfway or 2/3 of the way through when something completely off the wall happens at the perfect time to save our hero. Throughout, cliches are used and acknowledged as though that forgives their use. It doesn't.

Rating:
Summary: "Derailed" a non-stop read
Review: From the first chapter of "Derailed", I was hooked. It was sexy without being obsene and gritty without being vulgar. Siegel's main character was a man the masses could love to hate; wealthy, with a high salary and position, perfect wife and family life. A chance meeting on the morning train upends his entire life in the worst ways possible and we can't help but feel sympathy for the man, at the same time thinking that he brought it on himself.

I'll admit that I did manage to figure out what the plot twists were before they were revealed, and once revealed, they aren't really an audience-gripping "6th Sense" momment, but I don't believe they were intended to be huge, staggering revelations to begin with. And at the point that these early twists come out, the reader is already too immersed in the very fast-paced suspence driven story to even consider putting the book down.

Rating:
Summary: Brilliant start, but can't sustain its mometumn
Review: The premise is brilliant. A man falls into an affair, gets found out and blackmailed, and can't do anything about it without ruining multiple families. Unfortunately, while the first half of the book succeeds in keeping the pages turning, problems in the second half ultimately bring the book down to the level of an ordinary thriller.

As a previous reviewer stated, there are a number of improbabilities that hurt this book. While I know you have to suspend your disbelief to enjoy almost any thriller, Siegel asks too much of this, as too many unlikely events occur, and pieces fall too conveniently into place. It also doesn't help that we can see a twist coming shortly after getting into the novel - this could be forgiven, if only it was handled better.

As a cautionary tale against cheating on our wives, this one definitely succeeds. However, it's disappointing that there was such a letdown as the book went on, especially given its brilliant start. I'd still recommend reading it, especially given the dearth of truly good thrillers, but I don't think it measures up to his first novel. Nonetheless, I'm still looking forward to the release of Detour next month.

Rating:
Summary: Over the top and too improbable
Review: Derailed is the kind of book that is so improbable, so impossible that you end up rolling your eyes with every page you turn. The book had the potential to become a good noir thriller, but instead, it fizzles into a mess of nonsense.

Charles is a middle-aged man who's life borers normality. There isn't any spark left in his marriage and his daughter is afflicted with a severe case of diabetes. He's not that happy with his job anymore, and he's just looking for something to bring back the excitement in his life.

He finds it in Lucinda, a woman he sees on the train. He automatically falls in love with her. He begins an affair with her, something that culminates in their going to a cheap, dirty, sleazy motel together. But their session is quickly brought to a stop when a man bursts into their motel room and assaults them.

The man isn't about to disappear from Charles's life. Of course, he comes back. Asking for money. Then asking for more. And then more? And Charles? Like the sad puppy that he is, he lowers his eyes to the ground and does everything he's told to do. Add problems at work and with the police to this scenario, and Charles's life is quickly spiralling down into a cahotic mess.

There are three major flaws to be found in Derailed. For one, Siegel chose to write the story in the first person. The first quarter of the book is actually written in the third person, and it had me going, keeping my interest sustained. But then the novel veers in a new direction, the narrative voice changes, and the novel takes a turn for the worse. Spiegel isn't able to find a true voice for his character, which makes the narration sound so much more vague and distant.

Another major flaw can be found in the main character himself. There is nothing to like about Charles. He keeps putting himself in horrible situations, keeps digging his own grave, and we're supposed to care for him. Is it so hard to go to the police and tell them you're being blackmailed? Especially when your life and your family are at stake? Charles deserves everything that's coming to him. After a while, I was even wishing for him to fail!

The last major flaw can be found in two major plot twists during the course of this story. Siegel must think his readers are complete idiots. First, you can see where this story is going from a mile away. And two, the last plot twist, the one that saves our main character from his inevitable fate, is so ludicrous and out of context that it made me want to stop reading the book right there and then.

What could have been a good noir thriller in the tradition of Cain or Double Indemnity is nothing more than a cheesy and ludicrous story filled with stock characters and unbelieveable plots. Skip this one, you'll be doing yourself a favor.