- Hardcover: 368 pages
- Publisher: Doubleday (Feb 20 2001)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0385499035
- ISBN-13: 978-0385499033
- Product Dimensions: 23.6 x 16.3 x 3 cm
- Shipping Weight: 726 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars See all reviews (47 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #2,126,294 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Amazon
Alan Gregory, the Boulder psychologist who's starred in Stephen White's long-running series of suspense novels, takes second billing in The Program. The star is Kirsten Lord, a New Orleans prosecutor who lands in Gregory's office after her husband is killed and her daughter's life threatened by a criminal she sent to prison. "Every precious thing I lose, you will lose two" is the warning that sends her on the run until she finally lands in the Witness Protection Program. But the danger's a long way from over. As a prosecutor, she was a loud and public critic of "the program," and as events unfold, it appears that her deadliest enemies may not be safely behind bars.
Some of the most interesting passages put Kirsten and Gregory together in scenes that underscore White's professional expertise. A clinical psychologist in private practice in Boulder, he brings his understanding of human nature out of the consulting room and onto the page. Fans of Jonathan Kellerman's Alex Delaware will love Alan Gregory, whose relatively minor role at the start grows as the plot deepens and turns a hunt-and-chase thriller into a multidimensional, complex, and vividly realized novel. Long overdue for a place high on the bestseller list, White may well break out with this one. --Jane Adams
From Publishers Weekly
Once it recovers from a wobbly beginning, this ninth thriller in the bestselling series featuring Boulder, Colo., clinical psychologist Alan Gregory sprints competently along. Peyton Francis, aka Kirsten Lord, was once a New Orleans district attorney. Now she and her nine-year-old daughter are enrolled in the witness protection program, in hiding from Peyton's husband's assassin, who was most likely hired by a Colombian drug lord Peyton put away for life. Given a new ID and moved to Boulder, Peyton is befriended by another witness protection participant, a former mob hitman who, like herself, is referred by the Feds to Dr. Gregory for counseling. Plagued by doubts about the federal marshal entrusted with her safety and tortured by second thoughts about the impending execution of a black man she may have mistakenly sent to death row in Florida, Peyton races against time to stay the Florida execution, and is forced to go into hiding from the very witness protection forces assigned to protect her. The usually sure-handed White is guilty of some artless writing at the novel's start, creating a veritable obstacle course of meandering points of view, including an obscure long-running metaphoric thread linking repressed memories to images of a pod of whales. However, once the narrative drive settles mainly into Peyton's first-person voice, the story comes handily together. Featuring an interesting cast, including a young Texas schoolmarm turned professional hit person, a sinister cabal of federal marshals with hidden agendas and an entrepreneurial assassination broker in Atlanta, the narrative drives to an edge-of-your-seat denouement. Author tour. (Apr.)Forecast: This is not White's best effort, but fans of the series will check in to catch up on Alan Gregory's adventures his wife is pregnant with their first child in this installment.
Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
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First Sentence
The man was a good target. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt
The man was a good target. Read the first page
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Concordance
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Customer Reviews
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Most helpful customer reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
1.0 out of 5 stars
This has got to be Alan at his all time DUMBEST!,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Program (Mass Market Paperback)
In The Program, Alan Gregory has only a bit part this time but never has he been more lame. The main character, Peyton, is in the Witness Protection program because she has people wanting her and her daughter dead. Now they're missing, her house is in shambles, blood is present on the scene and Alan is once again whining about how he can't breech confidence unless he knows she's in imminent danger. Duh, Alan, what did the nice marshall just tell you about her house? He says that the front window is busted out, her bedroom furniture is all over the place and there is blood. Too bad, Alan the Righteous is still not talking! And I kid you not this is what Alan says:"Let's both of us pray that she met a guy and that her daugher's at a friend's house at a sleepover. I kid you not. Would someone please shoot Alan and put him out of his misery? Actually about the only character in this book that has enough sense to come in out of a hard pouring rain is the hit man, Carl. What a preposterous story. Weird too, the birth of their long awaited baby is barely a footnote. I would have thought it would be given more space than a bare mention. Definitely not Mr. White's best.
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good read but choppy plot,
By
This review is from: The Program (Mass Market Paperback)
Characters in this book were interesting. Especially Carl!The whole whale thread was very annoying and didn't mesh throughout the book. The best thing about S. White's books is he always has a fresh plotline and his writing is sharply drawn. He gives the characters humanity and humor and makes them leap off the pages. A good read but not his best.
5.0 out of 5 stars
A CAN'T PUT DOWN MULTI-LAYERED STORY,
By
This review is from: The Program (Mass Market Paperback)
A frightening multi-layered story, The Program introduces a new protagonist for Stephen White - New Orleans District Attorney Kirsten Lord. After Kirsten's husband is murdered by a hired gun, she soon discovers that her own life and that of her nine-year-old daughter's is threatened. Feeling she has no other valid choice she seeks safety in Boulder, Colorado under the Witness Protection Program. However, once in the program she meets another who is being protected, Carl Luppo. He is a lone mob hit man very much, she suspects, like the man who killed her husband. Sensing her danger, Luppo befriends Kirsten; he appoints himself her guardian. But, he is he truly knight errant or persecutor? Kirsten's chaotic life is in stark contrast to the relative tranquility enjoyed by Alan Gregory, a psychological consultant to the Protection Program and his wife who are preparing for the birth of their first child. There's both darkness and light in this suspenseful tale as it reveals the internal workings of the Witness Protection Program and the emotional toll it takes on those who have sought safety. It's a taut, finely paced drama for thriller afficionados. - Gail Cooke
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