Hell's Kitchen - Hardcover

William Jefferies; Jeffery Deaver

3.7

2,116 ratings by Goodreads

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0340818794 ISBN 13: 9780340818794

Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton, 2002

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The New York Times bestselling author of The Empty Chair and The Devil's Teardrop, is back displaying his "ticking-bomb suspense" (People) in this never-before-published thriller.
Every New York City neighborhood has a story, but what John Pellam uncovers in Hell's Kitchen has a darkness all its own. The Hollywood location scout and former stuntman is in the Big Apple hoping to capture the unvarnished memories of longtime Kitchen residents such as Ettie Washington in a no-budget documentary film. But when a suspicious fire ravages the elderly woman's crumbling tenement, Pellam realizes that someone might want the past to stay buried.
As more buildings and lives go up in flames, Pellam takes to the streets, seeking the twisted pyromaniac who sells services to the highest bidder. But Pellam is unaware that the fires are merely flickering preludes to the arsonist's ultimate masterpiece, a conflagration of nearly unimaginable proportion, with Hell's Kitchen -- and John Pellam -- at its blackened and searing epicenter.

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Review:

Perennial bestselling author Jeffrey Deaver's alter ego, William Jefferies, knows a thing or two about Hollywood. So does John Pellam, the hero of his previous Shallow Graves and Bloody River Blues and the latest in the series, Hell's Kitchen. Pellam made a name for himself as a director before a stint in San Quentin took him off the fast track. Since his release he's been earning his keep as a location scout and not so incidentally shooting a documentary about New York's Hell's Kitchen, which he hopes will propel him back into the career that skidded south after he ran afoul of the law.

Pellam has found the star of his new film, one Ettie Washington, who has lived in the neighborhood for decades and is the perfect voice to tell the story of an area that's losing its old-time seediness to urban gentrification. But then Ettie's tenement goes up in a blaze that kills a small boy and puts her right in the public eye--as a suspect. It's only the beginning of a series of fires, each one more deadly. The cops know Ettie couldn't have set the others, since she's been in jail, but they're convinced she knows who did. Pellam has his own reasons for getting Ettie off the hook and embarking on a search for the real pyromaniac. Jeffries saves the best one for the very end of this taut, well-paced, and highly atmospheric thriller. --Jane Adams

About the Author:

Jeffery Deaver, a former attorney, is the New York Times bestselling author of two collections of short stories and dozens of previous suspense novels. He is best known for his Kathryn Dance and Lincoln Rhyme thrillers, most notably The Bone Collector, which was made into a feature starring Denzel Washington and Angelina Jolie. His many awards include the Novel of the Year at the International Thriller Writers’ Awards in 2009 for his standalone novel The Bodies Left Behind. The latest entries in the Lincoln Rhyme series are The Cold Moon, The Broken Window, and The Burning Wire. Visit the author on Facebook or go to JefferyDeaver.com.

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