Falling
the most thrilling blockbuster read of the summer
-
-
3.9 • 46 Ratings
-
-
- $12.99
Publisher Description
‘Amazing . . . Intense suspense, shocks and scares plus chilling insider authenticity make this one very special’ LEE CHILD
'FALLING is the best kind of thriller (for me as a reader anyway). Characters you care deeply about. Nonstop, totally authentic suspense' JAMES PATTERSON
‘Attention, please: T. J. Newman has written the perfect thriller! GILLIAN FLYNN, #1 bestselling author of Gone Girl
You just boarded a flight to New York.
There are one hundred and forty-three other passengers onboard.
What you don’t know is that thirty minutes before the flight your pilot’s family was kidnapped.
For his family to live, everyone on your plane must die.
The only way the family will survive is if the pilot follows his orders and crashes the plane.
Enjoy the flight.
***Praise for Falling***
‘Think Speed on a passenger jet - with the cockpit dials turned up to supersonic’ Ian Rankin
‘Stunning and relentless. This is Jaws at 35,000 feet’ Don Winslow
‘The best thriller I’ve read in years. Buckle up’ Adrian McKinty
‘Amazing . . . Intense suspense, shocks and scares plus chilling insider authenticity make this one very special’ Lee Child
'FALLING is the best kind of thriller (for me as a reader anyway). Characters you care deeply about. Nonstop, totally authentic suspense' James Patterson
‘Attention, please: T. J. Newman has written the perfect thriller! ... Terrific and terrifying, a true page-turner.. A must-read for summer vacation' Gillian Flynn, #1 bestselling author of Gone Girl
‘A jet-propelled thriller that will have you in its grip from first page to last. A truly astonishing debut and an incredible work of pure suspense’ Steve Cavanagh
'Newman keeps up an extreme pace from the first page—a near-impossible task, considering that the hero is locked in a cockpit, unable to take action himself. This novel is like the films Die Hard and Speed on steroids, creating one of the year’s best thrillers' Library Journal
'Newman’s [flight attendant] background means Falling brings a freshness and depth to the genre' The Guardian
'A superlative debut . . . This tense, convincing thriller marks the arrival of an assured new talent' Publishers Weekly
' ...full of the kind of authentic detail that comes from personal experience' Literary Review
‘Gripping from the first sentence, this thriller is like no other’ OK! Magazine
'A remarkable debut' The Sunday Times
'... a tense and claustrophobic read, the fast-paced action zipping along at an astonishing rate' Refinery29
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Soon after Coastal Airways captain Bill Hoffman, the hero of former flight attendant Newman's superlative debut, is airborne on a flight from Los Angeles to JFK Airport, he gets a blank email from his wife, Carrie. The attached photo shows her and their 10-year-old son, Scott, standing in their living room, their faces covered with hoods and bombs strapped to their bodies. Then he gets a FaceTime call from Saman Khani, who presents the pilot with a choice: Bill must crash the plane, or the terrorist will kill Carrie, Scott, and Elise, the Hoffmans' baby. Telling anyone of the situation or sending anyone to the house will ensure their deaths. Determined to avoid choosing between the lives of his loved ones and those of his crewmates and the 144 passengers on the flight, Bill must use all his experience and smarts to achieve that impossible goal by trying to get help to his family via a crew member who has a trusted relative in the FBI and by taking the flight attendants into his confidence. Newman makes buy-in to the setup easy by ensuring every character, including Khani, is multidimensional. This tense, convincing thriller marks the arrival of an assured new talent.
Customer Reviews
All about that pace
Author
American (female). Former flight attendant. This is her first novel.
In brief
Happily married, all around American good guy (HMAAGG) airline pilot is in trouble with the missus for agreeing to take on an extra flight on a Saturday because it’s the start of his young son’s baseball season. Wifey also has an infant child in arms, who came along as something fo surprise almost 10 years after number one. HMAAGG tries to call wifey from the airport and the plane to patch things up, but gets no answer. Turns out Middle Eastern terrorist dude has taken her and the kids prisoner, and strapped them, as well as himself, into suicide vests. (Not the baby though. Suicide vests in double O are a niche market). Terrorist FaceTimes HMAAGG once he’s at cruising altitude and lays out his demands: crash the plane (I’ll tell you where later) or I’ll kill the wife and kids. Oh, and before you crash, sling this canister of aerosol poison into the cabin to kill off the passengers and crew. And don’t tell anyone. Got it? Suffice it to say, things don’t go exactly to plan, e.g. HMAAGG tells the senior flight attendant who spills the beans to her nephew in the FBI. A social media influencer on board spills the beans to half the population of the US after the flight attendants let loose the oxygen masks in preparation for the poison gas attack but give the passengers a bullsh*t excuse. Yada, yada. HMAAGG’s house in LA blows up, yada, yada, wifey and kids get away and the terrorist dude holding them gets dead but he has an accomplice on the plane, yada, yada, the final game of the World Series at Yankee stadium, jets are scrambled, yada, yada, HMAAGG gets shot, flight attendant helps land plane. Coffee and bandaging.
Writing
The prose is competent enough, if saccharine, the telling heavily pregnant with cliche and caricature, but the pace is relentless. Ms Newman deserves praise for highlighting the plight of the Kurds, who have been on the receiving end of more raw deals than I’ve had hot dinners, but I fear this tale will do more to harm than advance their cause in post-Trump America.
Bottom line
To paraphrase Megan Trainor, it’s all about that pace. Netflix or HBO? I wonder which it will be.
Note
Three weeks before this was published, British author Clare Mackintosh released Hostage, “a claustrophobic thriller set over twenty hours on a flight from London to Sydney.” Based on Ms Mackintosh’s track record and the short sample I read, it’s possible I picked up the wrong airplane thriller. Just sayin’.
Riveting… remarkable book for a first time author. Highly recommend.
The characters were just ordinary people going about their daily business. Highly relatable to all of us. Could have been anyone in this highly unpredictable world we live in. The people who stepped up to be hero’s were just ordinary people. The stakes were high but the human spirit to survive in spite of the odds being stacked against them was inspirational. I was moved by the perpetrators just as much as I was moved by the innocent people involved. This is a book about justice and fairness and a lesson to all of us that we need to stop looking the other way about things that don’t directly affect our lives. Humans need to start showing more compassion and empathy for every living thing. Everyone can do just one small thing and the world will be a better place.
Hold On!!
This book was amazing I loved every page of it. For a first book all I can say is WOW you nailed it.