HOSTAGE
Jeff Talley was a good husband, a fine father, and a frontline
negotiator with LAPD's SWAT unit. But the high stress, unforgiving job
took an irreparable toll on his psyche. After a despondent father
murders his wife and son and takes his own life, Talley hits bottom. His
marriage ends, he resigns from SWAT, and he struggles to escape from his
former life by taking the chief-of-police job in a sleepy, affluent
bedroom community far from the chaos and crime of Los Angeles.
But Talley's pursuit of peaceful small-town life is about to change when
three young men, fleeing the robbery of a mini-mart, invade a tightly
secured home, and take the family hostage. Plunged back into the
high-pressure world that he has desperately been trying to put behind
him, Talley finds his nightmare has barely begun, because this isn't
just any house. It belongs to a brilliant white-collar criminal who
launders money for L.A.'s renegade franchise of La Cosa Nostra. And the
accountant's records of the incriminating money trail that lie within
will put L.A.'s most lethal and volatile crime lord, Sonny Benza, behind
bars. As Talley desperately tries to save the innocents inside, the full
weight of Benza's wrath descends on him, putting Talley and his own
family at risk. Soon, all involved are held hostage by the exigencies of
fate and the only one capable of diffusing the crisis is the least
stable of them all.
THE TWO MINUTE RULE
Ask anyone on the wrong side of the law about the two minute rule and
they'll tell you that's as long as you can hope for at a robbery before
the cops show up. Break the two minute rule and it's a lifetime in jail.
But not everyone plays by the rules....
When ex-con Max Holman finally gets out of jail, freedom doesn't taste
too sweet. The only thing on his mind is reconciliation with his
estranged son, who is, ironically, a cop. But then he hears the
devastating news: His son and three other Los Angeles police officers
were gunned down in cold blood the night before Holman's release. When
the hit is exposed as a revenge killing and the question of police
corruption is raised, it becomes a father's last duty to clear his son's
name and catch the killer. With all the elements that have made Robert
Crais one of the very best crime novelists today, The Two Minute Rule is
gripping, edgy suspense from the author who sets the standard when it
comes to surprising plot twists and powerful characters.
