- Hardcover: 496 pages
- Publisher: Simon & Schuster (Oct 9 2001)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0684863618
- ISBN-13: 978-0684863610
- Product Dimensions: 23.6 x 16.3 x 4.1 cm
- Shipping Weight: 726 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (71 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #730,282 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Amazon
Medal of Honor winner Earl Swagger returns in a hard-hitting sequel to Stephen Hunter's best-selling Hot Springs, this time compelled by duty and friendship to follow his best friend, former Arkansas prosecutor Sam Vincent, to the most dangerous place in Mississippi. Sam has gone to Thebes, a prison for violent African American criminals, on a mission for a client. What he finds there is not only a travesty of justice, but a place where the inhumanity of the jailers is matched by the horrific secret research being carried out on helpless prisoners. Captured and tortured himself, Earl manages to escape, but in short order he's back, along with a hand-picked posse of aging sharpshooters who are eager to prove they've still got what it takes. They're also as intent as Earl is on unmasking the conspiracy and destroying the real criminals. Bloody, bullet-ridden, and brilliantly paced, this is Hunter at his explosive best. --Jane Adams
From Publishers Weekly
Earl Swagger, the gritty WWII-vet hero of Hunter's bestselling thriller Hot Springs, is back in this virtually un-put-downable gothic chiller about unspeakable evil in the murky Mississippi bayous. In 1951, five years after the conclusion of Hot Springs, straight arrow ex-county prosecutor Sam Vincent tells Earl - his trusted friend and former investigator, now a sergeant in the Arkansas state police - that he has been hired by a Chicago attorney to travel to Thebes, a mythic prison camp in the remote backwaters of Mississippi to verify the death of a black man who is the beneficiary of a will left by a one-time employer. When Earl hasn't heard from Sam by an agreed upon date, he goes looking for him and discovers that he is being held in the prison. Earl frees Sam, but is taken prisoner himself. Tortured by the prison hierarchy who fear he has been sent by a federal agency to expose their abominable secrets, Earl, aided by a trusty, escapes, vowing to return to destroy the camp and kill its evil warden and his henchmen. A staunch upholder of the law, self-righteous Sam refuses to participate in Earl's plan for retribution, but promises not to interfere. Assembling a strike force of seven of the country's most able gunmen, Earl sets out to wipe Thebes from the face of the earth. Meanwhile, probing the fate of a famous doctor who worked for the military researching biological warfare during WWII, Sam realizes Thebes may harbor an even darker secret after a bomb attempt on his life. Unforgettable characters in vivid settings more than offset the melodramatic, credibility stretching scenarios of the hard-driving thriller. Once again, Hunter proves he is a master of the cinematic prose. Agent, Esther Newberg, ICM. (Oct. 12).
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Inside This Book
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First Sentence
IN mid-1947, Jefferson Barnes, the prosecuting attorney of Polk County, Arkansas, finally died. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
IN mid-1947, Jefferson Barnes, the prosecuting attorney of Polk County, Arkansas, finally died. Read the first page
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Concordance
Browse Sample PagesConcordance
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
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Most helpful customer reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
Another Good Book by Hunter!,
By A Customer
This review is from: Pale Horse Coming (Mass Market Paperback)
Another really good read by Mr. Hunter, and stonger than Hot Springs. There is no writer quite like Hunter, so it is a pleasure to continue to have him as an author. I've read almost all his books and will continue to read as many more as he wishes to write.
4.0 out of 5 stars
A fun entertaining thriller,
By
This review is from: Pale Horse Coming (Mass Market Paperback)
Earl Swagger and his son Bob Lee are the antiheros of this wonderful series of thrillers by bestselling author, Stephen Hunter. Guns play a major part of his work. They are lovingly described and their use is always necessary to gain the desired result. The books are always thick, yet, the pages fly by so quickly that they read like much shorter books. The writing is always strong and sure and this latest is no exception.It is 1951 and Earl Swagger is approached by his good friend, Sam Vincent, ex prosecutor of Polk County, Arkansas. Sam accepts a job from a Chicago attorney to locate a black man living in Thebes State Penal Colony in Thebes, Mississippi. The prison is truly Hell on Earth surrounded by swamps and only accessible by a muddy river. The guards are brutal and gain much perverse pleasure in torturing the inmates. Sam just wants Earl to know where he is headed and to investigate his whereabouts if he doesn't return in a certain time. As expected, Sam is not heard from and Earl must start on his perilous journey to rescue his friend. Stephen Hunter, a film critic for The Washington Post, is an expert on entertainment and uses his expertise when creating his novels. They are among the best thrillers being written today. It is true that the plot can be quite contrived and silly at times, however, they work well. The characters are straight out of the pages of pulp fiction or comic books. The sadistic prison guard, Bigboy, is a pure stereotype. Earl is a superman able to suffer great punishment in just a few minutes than the mere mortal man can endure in a lifetime. Yet, it is fun to root for Earl Swagger to fight and defeat evil wherever he finds it.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Dy-no-mite,
By Helen Hunte (Brooklyn, New York USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Pale Horse Coming (Mass Market Paperback)
As with all of Stephen Hunter's Swagger books I've read, this was great, great, great, This is certainly not a 'guy' thing. I'll read this book again.
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