Zero Option

Deutermann, P. T.

3.93

402 ratings by Goodreads

ISBN 10: 1511386673 ISBN 13: 9781511386678

Publisher: Brilliance Audio, 2016

When FBI Agent David Stafford finds himself on the Bureau's "out" list for publicly blowing the whistle on a corrupt colleague, he receives a low-profile assignment to investigate an Atlanta military base, where someone is suspected of auctioning off equipment without authorization.

Now a cylinder containing an extremely hazardous biochemical weapon is missing, and Stafford is on the trail of the thief—traveling from the hills of Georgia to the halls of the Pentagon—in a race to recover the weapon before it falls into enemy hands.

With strong characters and a plot that is frighteningly real, Deutermann's Zero Option is his most commercial novel yet, reminiscent of Tom Clancy and Nelson DeMille.

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Review:

P.T. Deutermann's latest is a topnotch topical thriller bursting with the expected expertise and insider knowledge he picked up as a Navy captain and arms control specialist. It's also something else: an unexpectedly resonant portrait of people, good and bad, who have been chewed up and spit out by military bureaucracies. Both the hero (an unlucky military investigator named David Stafford, whose career has been short-circuited by whistle-blowing and whose personal life is a disaster area) and the heavy (a career Army bean counter and petty thief, Wendell Carson, who suddenly gets the chance to move up and almost blows it at every occasion) are carefully drawn and fully credible. So are the underlings, officers and FBI agents who thread through their lives. This becomes especially important when Stafford--trying to track down a container of deadly biological nerve gas that Carson has stolen from an Army base in Georgia--crosses paths with a young girl who seems to have psychic powers. In less skilled hands, this kind of rogue element could send a vehicle skittering. But Deutermann quickly gives the girl and her keepers (a mysteriously intriguing woman teacher, a protective small-town policeman) such a strong presence that they become vital to the story's exciting and moving conclusion. Other of his excellent thrillers available in paperback include The Edge of Honor, Official Privilege, Scorpion in the Sea, and Sweepers. --Dick Adler

From the Publisher:

"Right out of today's headlines...a superior thriller." --American Way

"Top-notch...Exciting, moving...Bursting with he expected expertise and insider knowledge." --Publishers Weekly

"A gripping tale...Solid, authentic detail that bolts each event to the next and creates an intensely plausible entertainment." --Kirkus Reviews

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