Soft Target: A Thriller

by Stephen Hunter

Overview

Another action-packed thriller from Stephen Hunter, this time starring Ray Cruz, the son of ex-Marine sniper Bob Lee Swagger, who was introduced in Hunter’s previous bestseller, Dead Zero.

Ten thousand people jam the aisles, the corridors, the elevators, and the escalators of America, the Mall—a giant Rubik’s Cube of a structure with its own amusement park located in the spacious center atrium. Of those people, 9,988 have come to shop. The other twelve have come to kill.

Ray Cruz, one of the heroes of Hunter’s last bestseller, Dead Zero, is in the mall with his fiancée and her family. The retired Marine sniper thought he was done with stalking and killing—but among the trapped thousands, he’s the only one with a plan and the guts to confront the self-proclaimed “Brigade Mumbai.” Now all he needs is a gun.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781668019139
Publisher:	Pocket Books
Publication date:	08/08/2023
Pages:	336
Sales rank:	259,445
Product dimensions:	4.10(w) x 7.40(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

Stephen Hunter has written over twenty novels. The retired chief film critic for The Washington Post, where he won the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for Distinguished Criticism, he has also published two collections of film criticism and a nonfiction work, American Gunfight. He lives in Baltimore, Maryland.

Read an Excerpt

Soft Target
The bullet hit Santa Claus beneath the left eye.

It shattered his skull, blew a large exit wound from the rear of that vessel, and drove a bright red spatter pattern across the pale satin of his throne like some sort of twisted abstract painting. Worse still, the ballistic energy unleashed an upper-body spasm that shook his hat comically askew, and it slipped off his face and caught on his ear and hung there like a large red sock.

The four-year-old girl sitting in his lap stared not so much in horror but in fascination. She understood that this was “different” but had no larger context against which to compare it. She had no acquaintance yet with the concept of horror and the human fear of seeing the body’s vaults penetrated and eviscerated, but she picked up immediately on the appropriate response from her mother, who grabbed her and started screaming as the hundreds of others clustered around Santa’s throne began to do the same.

Editorial Reviews

One of the Best Books of 2012

St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Stephen Hunter spent years reviewing movies for The Washington Post. That work gave him a keen sense of pacing and timing. The evidence shows up in Soft Target, which unrolls a complicated and grabby plot in just 256 tense pages. And Hunter packs in a surprise with the identity and motive of the individual behind the terrorist attack.”—St. Louis Post-Dispatch

“Hunter’s writing is sharp, detailed and laced with enough offhand wit to keep readers from sinking into the general gore and Islam-bashing. . . . Hunter has produced a fast, gratifying read.”—The Houston Chronicle

“A solid addition to Stephen Hunter’s sniper series, made more engaging by its invocation of current events and political posturing. I join his other fans in hoping he has another one already in the works.”—The Washington Times

“Stephen Hunter didn’t invent the high-action thriller. But, as he once again demonstrates in the lightning-paced Soft Target, he might as well have. . . . Soft Target is Die Hard with a brain and a plan. A lean, action-packed tale that begs to be read in a single sitting.”—The Providence Journal

“Fast-paced…fearsome.”—Publishers Weekly

“Combining elements of the locked-room mystery, the disaster novel, and the lock-and-load thriller, Hunter produces a remarkably gripping tale, building character (the captives, the bureaucrats, and the “terrorists” all get compelling backstories) every bit as convincingly as he drives the narrative to its High Noon–style finale.”—Booklist (starred review)

“Any thriller in which Middle Eastern terrorists whack Santa on the first page is bound to be exciting. As always, Hunter has crafted a fast-paced and all-too-plausible telling of our worst nightmares coming true. Ray Cruz is a worthy successor to Swagger. Hunter’s fans, along with new readers, will enjoy the violent battle between Cruz and the bad guys.”—Library Journal

“Black Friday [is] on the cusp of becoming blood-soaked Friday. . . . Among the shoppers, albeit reluctantly, is Ray Cruz, a retired marine sniper, son of the iconic marine sniper Bob Lee Swagger, whose valorous exploits Hunter has richly detailed (Dead Zero, 2010, etc.). . . . Snipers and SWAT teams gather, but only one man is in an advantageous tactical position, behind enemy lines, as it were. Only one man, but he’s Bob Lee Swagger’s son, and what a good thing it is that the apple hasn’t fallen far from the tree.”—Kirkus Reviews

From the Publisher

Fresh from Hunter's last blockbuster, Dead Zero, retired marine sergeant Ray Cruz is shopping at the Mall of America outside Minneapolis when the Mumbai Brigade drops in, intent on killing a lot of Americans in the heartland. As the brigade corners 1000 hostages and starts killing them one by one, Cruz leaps into action. Dead Zero was a hit; this should do well, too.

Library Journal