Mystery & Crime, Romance

Hide and Seek

Name: Hide and Seek
Author: James Patterson
ISBN: 9780446409292

by James Patterson

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Overview

It was the trial that electrified the world. Not only because of the defendant, Maggie Bradford, the woman whose songs captivated the world's heart. Not only because of the victim, Will Shepard, the world's most glamorous athlete. But also because everyone said Maggie had murdered not just one husband, but two. And because in Maggie's world - the world she feared and despised but could not escape, the world of the powerful, the rich, and the ruthless - both death and life could never be what they seemed. From James Patterson, bestselling author of KISS THE GIRLS and ALONG CAME A SPIDER, comes his most brilliantly realized thriller, a story that will shatter your expectations...and hold every last one of your nerves in thrall, with each twist of the plot and every turn of the page.

Maggie Bradford is one of the most beloved singer/songwriters anywhere. She's also the devoted mother of two children. She seems to have it all. And so, how could she have murdered not just one, but two of her husbands? With unrelenting suspense, James Patterson answers that question.

About the Author, James Patterson

James Patterson has had more New York Times bestsellers than any other writer, ever, according to Guinness World Records. Since his first novel won the Edgar Award in 1977 James Patterson's books have sold more than 240 million copies. He is the author of the Alex Cross novels, the most popular detective series of the past twenty-five years, including Kiss the Girls and Along Came a Spider. Mr. Patterson also writes the bestselling Women's Murder Club novels, set in San Francisco, and the top-selling New York detective series of all time, featuring Detective Michael Bennett. He writes full-time and lives in Florida with his family.

Biography

James Patterson had been working as a very successful advertising copywriter when he decided to put his Masters degree in English to a somewhat different use. Inspired by bestselling hair-raising thrillers like The Day of the Jackal and The Exorcist, Patterson went to work on his first novel. Published in 1976, The Thomas Berryman Number established him as a writer of tightly constructed mysteries that move forward with the velocity of a bullet. For his startling debut, Patterson was awarded the prestigious Edgar Award for Best First Mystery Novel—an auspicious beginning to one of the most successful careers in publishing.

A string of gripping standalone mysteries followed, but it was the 1992 release of Along Came a Spider that elevated Patterson to superstar status. Introducing Alex Cross, a brilliant black police detective/forensic psychologist, the novel was the first installment in a series of bestselling thrillers that has proved to be a cash cow for the author and his publisher.

Examining Patterson's track record, it's obvious that he believes one good series deserves another…maybe even a third! In 2001, he debuted the Women's Murder Club with 1st to Die, a fast-paced thriller featuring four female crime fighters living in San Francisco—a homicide detective, a medical examiner, an assistant D.A., and a cub reporter. The successful series has continued with other numerically titled installments. Then, spinning off a set of characters from a previous novel (1998's When the Wind Blows), in 2005 he published Maximum Ride: The Angel Experiment. Featuring a "flock" of genetically engineered flying children, the novel was a huge hit, especially with teen readers, and spawned a series of vastly popular fantasy adventures.

In addition to continuing his bestselling literary franchises, Patterson has also found time to co-author thrillers with other writers—including Peter de Jonge, Andrew Gross, Maxine Paetro, and Howard Roughan—and has even ventured into romance (Suzanne's Diary for Nicholas, Sam's Letters to Jennifer) and children's literature (santaKid). Writing at an astonishing pace, this prolific author has turned himself into a one-man publishing juggernaut, fulfilling his clearly stated ambition to become "the king of the page-turners."

Good To Know

Patterson's Suzanne's Diary For Nicholas was inspired by a diary his wife kept that tracked the development of their toddler son.

Two of Patterson's Alex Cross mysteries (Along Came a Spider and Kiss the Girls) have been turned into films starring Morgan Freeman; in 2007, a weekly television series premiered, based on the bestselling Women's Murder Club novels.

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Editorials

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

If Thomas Harris's psycho-thrillers are the creme de la creme of the genre, then Patterson's (Kiss the Girls; Along Came a Spider) are the skimmed milk-fluid, but low in substance. In his new novel, the author again lays down a narrative line so gripping-an effect achieved partly through a plethora of one-sentence paragraphs, la Sidney Sheldon-that the reader may not notice, or care, that characterization and originality have fallen by the wayside. Patterson tells his story through two points of view: there's the the first-person voice of Maggie Bradford, who kills her abusive husband in the novel's flashback prologue and has now become a world-famous singer-songwriter (``I love your music, Maggie,'' Barbra Streisand tells her); and there's a third-person narration that is often filtered through the eyes of Will Shepherd, the celebrated soccer star who romances Maggie after her interim lover, an older tycoon, dies of a heart attack. The devastatingly handsome Will likes to hurt women (``there was a distinctly good part in him, but also a bad part''), however, and sometimes even to kill them. Will seems to want Maggie to save him from himself. Using his beauty and charm on her and her children, he wins her hand in marriage. That union sets up a major-league deja vu, two murder trials that aren't quite riveting and a final Big Twist that will only surprise those fresh to the thriller genre. Still, Will's descent into cartoonishness, and various loose threads, will probably not bother readers swept along by this lightweight pop fiction.

Library Journal

Beautiful Maggie Bradford seems to have it all: a successful career as a singer/songwriter, fame, money, and two precious children. However, she killed her first husband in self-defense and now she's in jail awaiting trial for the murder of her second husband, Will Shepherd, a charming, psychotic professional soccer player. At first, Maggie's marriage seems fine, but soon Will begins to act irrationally. The increasing tension comes to a head when Maggie comes to believe that Will has been sexually abusing her daughter; the resulting confrontation ends in Will's death and Maggie's arrest. Climaxing in Maggie's celebrity trial, this page-turner delivers a solid punch, complete with a surprise ending. Patterson (Kiss the Girls, Little, Brown, 1995) offers a vivid, emotionally revealing tale. Recommended for public libraries. [Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 9/15/95.]-Stacie Browne Chandler, Whitman P.L., Mass.

Donna Seaman

Patterson takes his titles from nursery rhymes and child's play: Along Came a Spider (1992), Kiss the Girls (1994), and here the somewhat menacing game of hide-and-seek, a perfect tip-off to the mix of sweetness and evil in this quick read about a celebrity murder trial. Now there's an original idea. At any rate, Patterson's protagonist is a tall, blonde songwriter named Maggie who had a rotten childhood, then made a rotten marriage. When hubby attacks Maggie and their three-year-old daughter, Maggie shoots to kill, does, and then, mercifully, isn't charged with murder. Life goes on, and Maggie channels her grief into her music, moves to New York, and BAM! she's a star. The money pours in, she plays to adulating crowds, her music fills the airwaves. She falls in love with a wonderful man. Then he dies. Two down. Meanwhile, a very nasty boy named Will--whose mother abandoned him and his brother, whose father committed suicide, and whose aunt seduced him at a dangerously young age--is becoming a lethally nasty man. Will, a soccer star, is also famous and just happens to love Maggie's songs. When they marry, the media goes wild; when Will is shot dead, they're positively frenzied. Is the lovely songstress a killer, a black widow? Oy. This ranks right up there with chewing gum, but, hey, sometimes that's all you want, or can handle.