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The Barnes & Noble Review
Who is Gideon? In the powerhouse debut from Russell Andrews, a pen name for author Peter Gethers and mystery scribe David Handler, that's what struggling writer Carl Granville must desperately try to answer after blindly accepting an apparently unbelievable publishing deal. A briskly plotted, well-conceived, twisting-and-turning thriller about a project any writer would die for -- and in Carl's case, very well may -- Gideon is a savvy and sinister read.
At his agent's funeral in New York City, unpublished writer Carl Glanville -- an all-American type of guy: young, handsome, well built, with a determined heart and a lot of talent -- is introduced to Maggie Petersen, the top editor at New York's largest and most successful book publisher. Maggie claims that before her death, Carl's agent forwarded her a copy of his manuscript; Maggie read it, thought it was rough in places but brilliant in others, and would like to publish it. Next thing we know, not only is Carl offered the works from this publishing giant -- fancy advance galleys, publicity tour, a big marketing campaign -- but another deal as well. And this, my friends, is where Gideon begins to spark.
If Carl should accept this project, he will be paid a quarter of a million dollars to scribe a novel that, Maggie promises, will change the world; a million-copy announced printing goes a long way to add credence to Maggie's over-the-top prediction. The novel will be published anonymously and will be based on fact, on information Carl will receive in utmost secrecy from an unknown informant, known to both Maggie and Carl only as Gideon. While this Primary Colors-type project makes Carl feel extremely uncomfortable, the $50,000 advance that Maggie waves in front of his face, plus the promise to publish his novel with all the bells and whistles, is too much for Carl to turn down.
Ecstatic, Carl seeks out Toni-with-an-i, the beautiful actress-wannabe who has recently moved into his building. But when he arrives, Toni is bolting to an "All My Children" audition and is forced to take a rain check. Slightly disappointed but still flying high as a kite, Carl returns to his apartment to pop a cork by himself. Unfortunately, as Carl immediately realizes, he's not alone. An enormous, well-dressed stranger is sitting quietly in a corner, patiently awaiting Carl's return. This intruder, Harry, who we know has already committed two vicious, cold-blooded murders in a previous scene, is now the tough-as-nails partner of the frightened and angered Carl. For the next two weeks, Harry appears each morning with new information from Gideon, cooks Carl a gourmet breakfast, and sits quietly as Carl jots down notes. When Carl finishes, Harry collects the data, retapes it to his powerful thigh, and is off -- only to return the next morning with additional information from the enigmatic Gideon.
But who is Gideon? What is this story that he's writing, taken from the almost illegible scribbling of a young woman in the deep South in the mid-1950s? A million questions flood Carl's mind, but no answers follow. Soon, just as the story Carl is transcribing becomes extremely grim, sick, and horrible, the real-life murders begin, and Carl is on the run, a fugitive from the law and the life he once led -- and will likely never lead again.
Gideon is an electrifying novel. The writing team of Gethers and Handler has constructed a rapid-fire thriller with a titillating premise, slick writing, a vicious, well-conceived cast of characters, and an ending that will shock you off your beach chair. There's an innocent man on the run -- not only from the law but from someone who wants him dead for knowing too much about something that he doesn't really know anything about -- a death at every corner, a precarious love affair, and a surprise on almost every page. Gideon is a grade A tale, a perfect match for the hot summer sun. (Andrew LeCount)
Mike Lupica
Gideon is one of the smartest and most intricate thrillers you will read this summer. Or any summer, for that matter.
New York Daily News
Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly
The president of the U. S. has a secret so horrifying it even terrifies the priest he confesses to, in this debut thriller pitting ambitious, fallible politicians against a diabolical media mogul. Unsuspecting ghostwriter Carl Granville is enlisted by super-agent Maggie Peterson to take a hand-scrawled, stolen diary and turn it into a million-copy expos --but Carl is kept in the dark about whose story he's writing. The book is known only as "Gideon" and when Carl's apartment is trashed, the diary stolen and Maggie murdered, he soon discovers that nobody at the publishing house has any knowledge of the book deal. Branded the main suspect in Maggie's death, Carl goes on the lam, and with his Washington, D.C., ex-girlfriend Amanda Mays, tries to uncover the deadly conspiracy. The mess gets increasingly complicated, as the president commits suicide and the political climate is ripe for the First Lady to bid for the executive position. A homosexual priest, a British billionaire, an elderly midwife who knows all and a killer in disguise figure in the labyrinthine plot. Andrews is a pseudonym for Peter Gethers (The Dandy; The Cat Who Went to Paris) and David Handler (Kiddo): the ghostwriting angle is one of Handler's trademarks (he's the author of the popular Stewart Hoag mysteries). Dead-on publishing in-jokes are a lagniappe (Gethers is the former publisher of Villard); Carl has ghostwritten a series of Kathie Lee Gifford mysteries. Though saturated with winning details, however, the narrative, with its endless twists (blackmail, childhood secrets, love affairs) winds up with several complications too many, and this plethora of side plots dilutes the lucid, cumulative pleasures a good thriller is designed to evoke. $250,000 ad/promo; BOMC and QPB selections; author tour; audio rights: Brilliance Corp.; foreign rights sold to U.K., France and Holland. (June) Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.
Kirkus Reviews
A political conspiracy thriller with more fizzle than firepower. Who is Gideon? That is, who is he really? It's the burning question absolutely no one seems able to answer. Strange, since Carl Granville, a struggling young novelist, was offered a fat fee for a ghostwriting chore on the very subjectan assignment originating with Maggie Peterson, "the hottest editor in New York." The modus operandi proposed by her was certainly unconventional: Carl is to novelize by the numbers, so to speak. Periodically, she'll feed him material (extracted from a diary) that he's to convert into fictional increments of an eventual whole. Will he accept the conditions? Broke and at loose ends, of course he would. But when Maggie becomes defunct and no one at Apex Communications, her firm, will admit to having heard of Gideon, life gets complicated for Carl. Even more so when the local corpse count skyrockets, and the police seem alarmingly eager to credit Carl with multiple offings. Only Amanda Mays, Carl's ex-flame, persists in regarding him as constitutionally nonlethal. To her, he still looks like "an overgrown Campbell's Soup kid." In any case, the two partner up and go on the lam, pursued by contract killers who are efficient, implacable, and staples of this kind of fiction. And when our heroes decide it's up to them, them alone, to solve the Gideon mystery, few thriller buffs will be taken aback. Nor will any of them gasp at the denouementon learning how high an echelon has been tainted by political wickedness and chicanery. What's a wannabe blockbuster without a conspiring top banana? A suspense-fiction pastiche in which characterization is thin, pacing lethargic, and freshness inshort supply: the first team effort from Peter Gethers (A Cat Abroad, 1993, etc.) and David Handler (The Man Who Loved Women to Death, 1997, etc.). (Book-of-the-Month/Quality Paperback; $250,000 ad/promo; author tour)
From the Publisher
"THE EFFECT IS A BIT LIKE ROLLING DOWN A GRASSY HILL . . . YOU PICK UP SERIOUS SPEED. . . . Writer Carl Granville - down on his luck personally and professionally - is approached one day by a hotshot publisher who says she'll pay him a startling amount of money to turn a top secret diary into a novel. Gift from God or devilish trap? . . . The conspiracy he gets tangled in plays on some seriously topical fears."
-Entertainment Weekly
"THE BOOK'S GOT EVERYTHING A BIG ADVENTURE THRILLER SHOULD - a potentially world-shaking secret, nearly invincible villains, vulnerable protagonists on the run, romance, [and] betrayal. . . . What takes it a step beyond . . . are the seriousness of its message and the playfulness with which it bites the hand that publishes it."
-Los Angeles Times
"FRANTIC . . . NOTHING IS EVER AS IT SEEMS."
-The Boston Globe
"THIS ONE WILL KEEP YOU GUESSING UNTIL THE END."
-Houston Chronicle