Product Description

The setting is a reality-based TV show on a remote desert island. Viewers from all round the world have complete access - 24 hours a day, 7 days a week - as twelve very different contestants confront their greatest fears, in expectation of a winning payoff of two million dollars. But then someone very sinister steals the show, when a mysterious voice called CONTROL explains that each participant is harbouring a lethal virus, fatal within twenty-four hours without a daily vaccine. Each day one of the contestants will not receive this vaccine . and it's up to the viewing public to decide which one of them to 'evict'. What will the doomed players do in their desperation to win viewer support? Which of them will win through to become the sole survivor? And who is the secret mastermind calling himself CONTROL?

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #422070 in Books
• Published on: 2002-08-09
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 320 pages

About the Author
Jim Brown is a broadcast journalist and three-time winner of the Associated Press Best Newscast Award. He has been a crime reporter and has written a newspaper column for three years. He lives in America.

Customer Reviews

Big Brother and Survivor given a deadly twist
This book is so pacily written and gripping that I was able to read it in two days flat, only stopping to sleep. it is both a superbly crafted thriller and deep social commentary at the same time posing some pretty harsh questions and forcing us to look very hard at ourselves in a mirror. The concept is simple, 12 contestants on a desert island for a reality tv show (a la Survivor) called '24/7'. They will be watched by over 600 video cameras and relayed to households all over the planet via tv and the internet as the contestants have to perform tasks and win over the audience so that they will not be voted off the island by the viewers and miss out on the ultimate prize, $2 million plus the winners heart's desire. That is what's meant to happen. What actually happens is all the tv crew on the island for the first episode die a painful and hideous death (faces boil and explode - nice) then a voice called 'Control' informs the 12 contestants that they have been infected with a man made super virus, a spin off from Ebola, and every 24 hours they will each be given a syringe containing an antidote. But, the antidote will only work for 24 hours and after the first day the viewers, the public, you, me, your mate and his Granny will vote on someone to be exiled from the island, except exile means death. That pretty much covers what occurs in the opening two chapters of the book. From then on the book does not let up it's pace as the contestants try to stay alive and the President and Navy try their hardest to solve the puzzle of who is Control and why he or she is doing this.
Given that we have so many reality shows on tv these days this book comes as quite a chilling and very possible 'what if'. As the author notes in his postscript what happens in 24/7 is not only possible but very likely to happen. A frightening thought indeed. Worse than that though is the thought that we, as an audience, would watch a programme like this as much as we watch Big Brother now. What does that say about us and our society?
This is one of the questions the Author poses, and before you ask no he does not pose an answer, that is for us as individual readers to do. It certainly gets you thinking though.
This is a tremendously entertaining and thought provoking first novel from an Author who shall have to be watched to see what else he has up his sleeve for his next book.
Well worth a read, especially for all you Big Brother fans out there.

Absolute brilliance
This book has to be one of the, if not the book I've ever read. I simply could not put this down. I know many people say that about books in reviews (myself included) but if any book is deserved of that title it is this one.
The characters are developed brilliantly with a certain sense of panache.The brief looks at White House politics also really do give this book an extra something.
Fast paced is an under statement -the book rally is a white knuckle ride. I cannot stress strongly enough how much you should all go and buy it! (and no, i don't work for the publishers ;-)
The book should have got six stars. For anyone who has read Hector McDonalds books, u will enjoy this. Just plain and simply - BY THIS BOOK!

Reality Bites
There is no doubt that with the phenomenon of reality television now reaching its zenith Jim Brown has jumped onto a very populist bandwagon. But as with Ben Elton's Dead Famous he has done it very well. It is a far more serious look at the whole reality television culture and has a number of twists and turns that make it hard to put down. While there seem to be a number of story lines all at once, a mad bomber who hears god being one, Brown brings them all together beautifully for the dramatic climax to his story. It begins with a simple TV show and reaches right to the president without ever seeming too far fetched with the possible exception of a couple of moments in the finale. The book is well crafted and has a number of pressure points that build the almost unbearable tension. There are also a number of moments that will genuinely shock even the most jaded reader because often no matter how well you guess what is about to happen it is never quite right. 24/7 is not for the squeamish as a number of scenes in it paint a less then pleasant picture but this just adds to the all-pervading atmosphere of the story. Without a doubt if you have ever watched reality TV even just dipped in and out this book will hit a nerve and it will be a struggle to put it down. I would recommend this to anybody who is looking for a thriller that has just enough elements of reality to make it a more then believable and worrying tale.