Two minutes can be a lifetime.
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 uniformed cops were gunned down in cold blood in Los Angeles 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 writers 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.
Most reviewers are slaphappy with praise for Robert Crais's 13th novel. While some critics note a preference for his Elvis Cole books, they find that believable, complex characters, the vibrant settings around Los Angeles—from the dive bars to the straitjacketed Los Angeles river—and heartfelt emotions separate
The Two Minute Rule—and Crais—from the bulk of crime fiction. The sharp note of dissent from the
Oregonian only serves to reinforce the impression that middle-of-the road Crais is better than many other writers' best.
Copyright © 2004 Phillips & Nelson Media, Inc.
Two minutes, in and out, that's the rule for robbing banks in this page-turning action ride around L.A. from bestseller Crais (
Hostage). Break that rule, and you can end up like Marchenko and Parsons, dying in a violent shoot-out on the streets, the fortune from their string of heists deeply hidden. Max Holman certainly knows the time limit better than most. Dubbed the "hero bandit" by the press, he got caught during a robbery after he stopped to perform CPR on a bank customer who had a heart attack. About to leave prison on parole, the 48-year-old Max hopes he can establish contact with the son he never really knew, now a cop. When Max's son is murdered, suspected of being in a ring of dirty cops seeking the Marchenko and Parsons loot, Max needs to know the truth. The only person he figures can help him is Katherine Pollard, the fed who nabbed him, who's now ex-FBI and a struggling single mom. The perfect odd couple, they keep this novel personal and real as it builds to an exciting twist on the bank-robbing rule.
200,000 first printing; 15-city author tour. (Mar.) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Max Holman is a career criminal. At least he was until he violated the two-minute rule, bank robbery's inviolable maxim. When he stayed in the bank four minutes, he was arrested by FBI agent Katherine Pollard. The intervening decade hasn't been kind to either of them. Holman spent it in jail; Pollard quit the FBI to raise her kids and then lost her husband to his secretary and death, in that order. The day Holman is paroled from prison he learns that his son, Richie, an LAPD officer, was gunned down. The investigating officers assure Holman that Richie's killer acted alone and then committed suicide. Something doesn't feel right, and Holman turns to Pollard, the only cop he ever trusted. She is suffocating in a cash-poor widow's hell and reluctantly begins to help Holman investigate. The unlikely allies butt up against a seemingly impenetrable wall of corruption and soon find many of their theories discredited. In general, Crais' Elvis Cole novels are superior to his stand-alone thrillers, but this is his best effort yet in the latter category. Pollard and Holman are carefully drawn, flawed, but empathetic characters. One of Crais' previous thrillers,
Hostage (2001), resurfaced as a movie starring Bruce Willis. This might work for Willis, too, possibly with Sandra Bullock as Pollard.
Wes LukowskyCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
