The Most Popular Bestsellers Books - Thriller Novels - David Baldacci's The Escape Info, Plot Summary, Review and David Baldacci Biography
Author: David Baldacci
Book: The Escape (480 Pgs.)
It’s a prison unlike any other. Military discipline rules. Its security systems are unmatched. None of its prisoners dream of escaping. They know it’s impossible . . . until now.
David Baldacci-The Escape
David Baldacci-The Escape - Review
Reviewed by DOUG CHILDERS
David Baldacci’s new thriller, “The Escape,” opens with a scene that takes readers from zero to 60 in six pages.
Two large storms converging over Kansas knock out the power to the United States Disciplinary Barracks (“America’s foremost military prison,” Baldacci writes), and soon — despite all precautions — the prison’s massive backup generator fails, too. Then, you guessed it: the automatic cell doors pop open, and the prisoners step out.
In the chaos that follows, guards hear shots fired — “undetermined location, unknown source,” a guard says, shouting into his radio.
“And since none of the guards had guns, that meant one of the prisoners must,” Baldacci writes. “Maybe more than one.”
In the mounting hysteria, something explodes. Military police in riot gear flood in from nearby Fort Leavenworth, and they eventually corral the prisoners back into their cells.
A head count turns up a problem, though: Robert Puller, a former Air Force major and a brilliant cyber-security expert serving a life sentence for treason, is missing. And a dead man is lying in Puller’s bunk. No one knows who the dead man is … or where Puller has gone.
It’s a heck of an opening chapter, guaranteed to jettison readers into hours of addictive reading. And since this is a Baldacci thriller, they’re likely to finish “The Escape” in a state of heightened, government-wary paranoia.
After all, Richmond native Baldacci has built a bestselling career out of a reliable chestnut: Absolute power corrupts absolutely, and while the federal government is full of dedicated, hard-working good guys, there are enough bad eggs to fill a bookshelf of thrillers.
Meanwhile, post-escape, the government enlists the escapee’s brother, John, in the manhunt. John Puller, a combat veteran and an agent in the Army’s Criminal Investigation Command, has saved the world in two previous Baldacci thrillers, and he’s a bona fide good guy. (Robert Puller has made appearances in the series as well, albeit prison-bound.) But an investigator from the Army’s Intelligence and Security Command tags along to keep an eye on him, given his relationship to the escapee.
Soon, John Puller’s investigation convinces him — and ultimately his skeptical minder/partner, too — that his brother (now “the most wanted man in America”) is neither a traitor nor a murderer. Staying alive long enough to prove it might be difficult, though. As always in a Baldacci thriller, it’s tough to tell the good guys from the bad ones, and they’re all armed and ready to fight.
Baldacci’s last few books have been among the best in his long, busy career, and “The Escape” stands near the top for sheer adrenalin-fueled entertainment. It’s alarmingly topical, too, taking us into the intelligence community and raising questions about privacy rights in the age of government surveillance and other buzz-worthy issues (no spoilers here).
Indeed, the crime at the center of “The Escape” could have been pulled from recent newspaper headlines. Who says thrillers have to be the stuff of escapist fantasies?
Two large storms converging over Kansas knock out the power to the United States Disciplinary Barracks (“America’s foremost military prison,” Baldacci writes), and soon — despite all precautions — the prison’s massive backup generator fails, too. Then, you guessed it: the automatic cell doors pop open, and the prisoners step out.
In the chaos that follows, guards hear shots fired — “undetermined location, unknown source,” a guard says, shouting into his radio.
“And since none of the guards had guns, that meant one of the prisoners must,” Baldacci writes. “Maybe more than one.”
In the mounting hysteria, something explodes. Military police in riot gear flood in from nearby Fort Leavenworth, and they eventually corral the prisoners back into their cells.
A head count turns up a problem, though: Robert Puller, a former Air Force major and a brilliant cyber-security expert serving a life sentence for treason, is missing. And a dead man is lying in Puller’s bunk. No one knows who the dead man is … or where Puller has gone.
It’s a heck of an opening chapter, guaranteed to jettison readers into hours of addictive reading. And since this is a Baldacci thriller, they’re likely to finish “The Escape” in a state of heightened, government-wary paranoia.
After all, Richmond native Baldacci has built a bestselling career out of a reliable chestnut: Absolute power corrupts absolutely, and while the federal government is full of dedicated, hard-working good guys, there are enough bad eggs to fill a bookshelf of thrillers.
Meanwhile, post-escape, the government enlists the escapee’s brother, John, in the manhunt. John Puller, a combat veteran and an agent in the Army’s Criminal Investigation Command, has saved the world in two previous Baldacci thrillers, and he’s a bona fide good guy. (Robert Puller has made appearances in the series as well, albeit prison-bound.) But an investigator from the Army’s Intelligence and Security Command tags along to keep an eye on him, given his relationship to the escapee.
Soon, John Puller’s investigation convinces him — and ultimately his skeptical minder/partner, too — that his brother (now “the most wanted man in America”) is neither a traitor nor a murderer. Staying alive long enough to prove it might be difficult, though. As always in a Baldacci thriller, it’s tough to tell the good guys from the bad ones, and they’re all armed and ready to fight.
Baldacci’s last few books have been among the best in his long, busy career, and “The Escape” stands near the top for sheer adrenalin-fueled entertainment. It’s alarmingly topical, too, taking us into the intelligence community and raising questions about privacy rights in the age of government surveillance and other buzz-worthy issues (no spoilers here).
Indeed, the crime at the center of “The Escape” could have been pulled from recent newspaper headlines. Who says thrillers have to be the stuff of escapist fantasies?
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