BookBrowse Reviews Night Fall by Nelson DeMille

A timely and intense thriller.

Comment: Set in the summer of 2001 Night Fall centers on a fictional investigation of the 1996 crash of TWA Flight 800 - when a Boeing 747, bound for Paris with 230 people aboard, exploded into the sea off Long Island.  Five years later John Corey, fresh from his adventures in Plum Island and The Lion's Game , is on the case along with his wife, FBI agent Kate Mayfield - both of whom work for an anti-terrorist task force made up of policemen and CIA/FBI agents.  Kate has persuaded John to take another look at the evidence because she doesn't buy the official report of 'mechanical failure', especially considering there are 200 eyewitnesses who are on record saying that they saw a missile shoot the airplane down.  The fact that he is being warned against getting involved in this old case only spurs Corey to heighten his investigation; and soon he uncovers evidence of an amateur video recording made inadvertently by a couple who were recording their adulterous affair on the beach that same night  (the excerpt at BookBrowse describes this beach scene and does contain some reasonably graphic sexual descriptions).

Publishers Weekly says, 'the pages will turn in a blur as a feeling of dread grows, until the end comes and one's worst fears are confirmed', while Frances Wilkens writing for Booklist describes it as 'a timely and intense thriller starring a thoroughly likable hero'.

This review first ran in the November 9, 2005 issue of BookBrowse Recommends.