Hostage

Rating:
Summary: Hostage
Review: I was lucky enough to discover Robert Crais with his second novel, Stalking the Angel [ his first was The Monkey's Raincoat which introduced detectives Elvis Cole and Joe Pike.] The series was modern, well written and reminded me of an updated version of Robert B. Parker's Spenser and Hawk [well actually, an updated Spenser and Sylvester Stallone's Cobra].

Crais is one of the few authors whose work I buy in hardcover as soon as it's published. With my time being what it is, I just got around to reading Hostage, Crais' latest [which is now out in paperback]. Although not an Elvis Cole novel, it is without a doubt my favorite work by Crais [who as I've said is always very good].

The cool thing about this novel is that the suspense starts on page one and continues to build and build and build. The book has received outstanding reviews from critics and fans alike. Bruce Willis has optioned the book for a movie [which would be an excellent vehicle for him]!

So what are you waiting for, Hostage is available now ... and watch for Elvis and Joe Pike to return soon in Crais' The Last Detective!

Rating:
Summary: Crais Never Seems to Miss
Review: This is another terrific thriller by Richard Crais. He did not miss a beat after leaving Elvis Cole and Pike. Gone is the humorous wise-cracking p.i. This book centers around a tormented cop, loser small time thugs and big-time organized crime members. There are as many, or more twists and turns as the Cole novels, but the characters leave their humor behind - there is no time for it in this tense hostage situation.

This book is set up in a unique manner. The story progresses by the telling of several characters' points of view. A few pages of Talley - the tormented cop; a few by one of the hostages; a few by one "bad guy" and a few by another "bad guy", etc. Crais adroitly keeps the story moving fast in this manner. More importantly - and impressively - he does not give the reader any tips even though both sides - or rather, all sides - of the story are told at once. It only adds to the suspense of this thriller/mystery.

This book would have been a solid five star, but it seemed to drift a bit in the middle. On the hand, you better have time to read the last fifty pages non-stop because you won't be able to put the book down.

Rating:
Summary: Hostage
Review: One of the best novels I've read in the last 2 years. One that I will read again. A page-turner with characters I cared about. This one book made me buy everything I could find by Robert Crais.

Rating:
Summary: A real page-turner
Review: This is probably the best action/thriller-type book I've ever read. Most books of this type have predictable elements and substantial sections where they drag, but this one doesn't. Crais does an excellent job of keeping the tension high and continually cranking it higher, without resorting to ridiculous situations or unbelievable events. It's very well paced, with believable characters and situations. It really never flags.

Despite a few slightly over-written passages...and an occasional excess of exclamation marks, the book is much better written than most books of this type. It will keep you turning the pages until you finish it, I'm sure of it.

Rating:
Summary: COULD HAVE BEEN A TEN!!!!!
Review: What a book!!!!!!! Have read several books and I don't remember one I enjoyed any more. Police Chief, Jeff Talley, formerly with LAPD SWAT unit, finds himself with three men in a house with three hostages. As the book progresses we find out the man who is hostage is also CPA for part of the mob. He has records in his house that can send them all to prison. Now the police want in the house and the hostages out, but the people there for the mob just want in the house to get the computor disc. The story will hold you on the edge. There is fake FBI people, cops on the side of the mob, raw policeman and then there is Jeff Talley. The book has a few surprises and a twist at the ending. I did not want to put it down. It was great.

Rating:
Summary: Tormented Soul
Review: Robert Crais is so masterful at describing a tormented soul, a man at the depths of despair, that the reader quickly experiences a strong sense of empathy with his main protagonist, Jeff Talley. Talley, a former SWAT crisis negotiator with the LAPD, carries psychological wounds from a hostage intervention gone bad. His own soul is now held hostage by his failure. Retreating from his former life at the cost of his marriage and family, he has moved on to a small suburban police department and lives an unfulfilling life in his quest to leave his anguish behind. Then BAM!...Crais catapults his emotionally tortured main character and you, the empathetic reader, into a horrific crime scene and terrifying hostage situation. Now, the reader becomes Talley in a race against time to save not only the obvious hostages, but his family and himself. Crais has the reader feeling what Talley feels throughout the exhilarating non-stop action and suspense. If your heart pounded walking the psychological tightrope with emotionally tormented hero, John "Lilly" Lelankevitch in "Evil, Be Gone," get back on the highwire with Jeff Talley in "Hostage." --Robert John Estko, author of "Evil, Be Gone"

Rating:
Summary: Very Good Read
Review: This book was an excellent read, even though I did it on book on tape i loved every minute of it. It kept your attention and even though it jumps for different characters points of view during the book you are able to follow the action...

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Summary: Only tigers CAN'T change their stripes
Review: We don't like to see our favorite authors change their characters. Europeans continually criticize Americans for having as much vicarious pleasure in building our heroes up, as we do in then tearing them down.

So we start with Robert Crais' quintesential duo, Elvis Cole and Joe Pike. But they're not all. Dave Robicheaux is the creation of James Lee Burke. And of course Angie and Patrick from Dennis Lehane; Lord Lynley and Barbara Havers from Elizabeth George; Lucas Davenport from John Sandford.

But as a reader, one of the thousands who revel in the dialogue, the gritty prose, the intimacy of the characters, and the plot, I have to wonder how much can these characters take? Adultery; alcoholism; the loss of a child, a mate, a partner; the breaching of trust; injury; beatings.

So after awhile one hopes that the author will utilize his or her enormous talent, and bring us down a new path, a new road, a new adventure.

Lehane has his Mystic River and Sean Devine; Crais created his Carol Starkey. And sometimes we forget why we wanted these new characters. Because the old ones couldn't do anything else. They had done it all. They needed a vacation. And often we are critical of such literary courage. It has to be tough to cash in your chips on a completely commercial success and start anew. I would imagine it takes more than a little courage.

So with that, Robert Crais introduces Jeff Talley, former LAPD S.W.A.T. hostage negotiator, running from his self inflicted torture, now up to his neck in deja vu.

I won't tell you the plot or the outcome. I like the idea that Hostage is an enormous play on words and that we are all hostages of our past until we reconcile that the past has no grip on the present. But Robert Crais didn't tell me that and either does Jeff Talley.

This is a good book. Really, I give it 4 1/2 stars. Enjoy one of our best contemporary writers at his craft. I'm sure Elvis and Joe will ride again and we can go back to them and chuckle at their witicisms. Well, we can chuckle at Elvis. Joe doesn't say much.

But Hostage is the real deal. And so is Crais.

Rating:
Summary: Hostage
Review: Efficient, forgettable formula suspense in the Desperate Hours mold from a writer who's done much better work. The bad news for Jeff Talley, the crisis negotiator who left an LAPD SWAT team-and incidentally his wife and daughter-to become chief of the police force in safely suburban Bristo Camino, is that a trio of small-time crooks, incapable of holding up a local convenience store without shooting the owner, has gone to ground in George Smith's house, taking Smith and his two children-Jennifer, 16, and Thomas, 10-captive. The worse news is that although two of the three wanted men, Dennis Rooney and his kid brother Kevin, are nothing but penny-ante losers, the third, Mars Krupchek, is a full-blown psycho with a lovingly detailed history of torture killings. The even worse news is that inoffensive George Smith is actually a mob accountant for L.A. crimelord Sonny Benza, a man who'll do whatever it takes to make sure his men are the first people inside the Smith house to clear it of incriminating evidence, and who's not going to let any police chief, certainly not anybody with an abductable wife and daughter, get in his way. Crais keeps the pot at a constant boil by switching focus every few paragraphs from the deviously plotting mobsters to the panicking perps to the hostages who keep trying fancy maneuvers that are 100% guaranteed to make their captors really, really mad. But since nobody involved has any human reality beyond the requirements of the situation, the suspense, though considerable, is a lot more synthetic than in Demolition Angel (2000). Connoisseurs will have no trouble predicting a finale awash in corpses, every one of them richly deserving of its gory fate. Film rights have already been sold to MGM. If you wait for the movie, you'll see Bruce Willis, and you won't miss a thing.

Rating:
Summary: Tight, fast crime story.
Review: In this tight, fast-paced police thriller, Chief of Police Jeff Talley would like nothing more than to start a new existance, leaving the shattered pieces of the life he once loved behind him. However, there were bigger forces at work, and Talley would soon find his quiet little suburb in the midst of multiple homicides, kidnappings, and hostage takings. Even more disturbing, however, is that these are the least of his problems.

In Hostage, Robert Crais takes his second stab at the 'damaged cop with a painful past' story (the first Demolition Angel), and does a credible job with the tale. The characters are a decent combination of primary characters with emotional and literary depth and secondary characters of sufficient variety to keep them all from blending together. A coupld of the plot twists felt a little contrived, but not so much as to ruin the credibility of the story.

All in all, a worthwhile read. Fast and engaging, with all the right elements for a crime thriller.