Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #22801 in Books
• Published on: 2002-06-20
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 496 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
With his new thiller Dead Sleep, Greg Iles lives up to the promise of his previous bestseller 24 Hours by showcasing his ability to deliver top-level suspense as well as multi-dimensional characterisation. When Jordan Glass, a world-renowned photojournalist, happens on an exhibit of a series of paintings known as "The Sleeping Women", she is stunned to discover that one of the models--a nude who, like the other women in the paintings, looks dead rather than asleep--is her mirror image. But Jordan knows the face in the painting isn't her; it's her twin sister Jane, who disappeared from her New Orleans home more than a year ago and is presumed to have been murdered by a serial killer who's been snatching women off the streets of the Crescent City for at least that long. None of the bodies of the missing women have turned up, but their faces match the models in the other Sleeping Women paintings. A veteran FBI agent named John Kaiser brings Jordan into the Bureau's hunt for the anonymous artist, who may also know something about the disappearance of Jordan's father in Vietnam almost 30 years before.

This is a taut, well-crafted thriller with a nice secondary love story that's woven into the action without slowing it down. Jordan is a fascinating, many-sided character who's a little too tough to be wholly believable, but that's a minor quibble. While winning well-deserved new fans for Iles, Dead Sleep will keep his readers awake until the very last page. --Jane Adams, Amazon.com

FHM Magazine
'A chunky holiday read'

Review
'Greg Iles is a phenomenal writer' (Independent on Sunday 20011008)

'This one bounds along keeping you turning the pages long after sleep beckons' (Independent on Sunday )

'A potent thriller' (New York Times Book Review )

'A chunky holiday read' (FHM Magazine )

'Another top notch tale of suspense from Iles' (Kirkus Reviews )

"A narrative as ingenious as it is bizarre" (New York Times Book Review )

"Iles continues to amaze with his incredible range." (Publishers Weekly on Dead Sleep )

"Atmospheric, sexy and provocative." (Booklist on Dead Sleep )

'Another page turner' (Sheffield Telegraph )

'A superb plot, with unexpected twists and turns. Iles just gets better and better' (Yorkshire Evening Post )

'A stunnning opening to a complex thriller. Bottom line: Cancel Bedtime. A Beach Book of the Week.' (People Magazine )

Customer Reviews

A touch formulaic, but superior formula
The twin sister of an award winning photographer goes missing - simply disappears. There have been other disappearances, but no bodies, so no one can officially treat this as a serial killer at work. Months later, the photographer comes across paintings, paintings of naked women … including her sister. The portraits, however, look suspiciously like images of death. And so begins the hunt for the killer, the photographer teaming up with a very special FBI agent. Inevitably, the hunter will find herself hunted.

It's an excellent premise - the portraits of the dead. There is abundant scope for psychological investigation and analysis, for in-depth characterisation of the killer. What we get, however, is a largely formulaic thriller - the heroine is glamorous, talented, the hero glamorous and talented, the FBI is wonderful, money appears no object, it's all a bit glitzy, a bit, well, glamorous. The story could have been much edgier, much darker, but it appears sanitised - Iles is going for the Hollywood blockbuster, not the art house movie.

Nevertheless, Greg Iles writes a well-paced thriller. It's a page turner of a novel which will keep you engrossed right to the end. Not a demanding read - it's glamorous rather than sophisticated - but the sort of book you'd take on a long journey or use to switch off over a weekend. Well written, good concept, enjoyable read, pity it's underdeveloped.

Simply the best
I needed something to read and this book sounded interesting. I have never read Iles before and normally when I take a chance on a new author it all goes horribly wrong and I find I've just wasted time and money on a book that will sit on my shelf gathering dust.

Not this time. This book takes your hand and leads you into a story that is constantly unfolding with revelations, setbacks, hope and despair.

As the cover says the story is about a woman photojournalist who by chance sees a portrait of her missing, presumed dead, sister who disappeared over a year before. She of course is anxious to find out the truth and the only way which she can do this is to co-operate with the FBI and hope they don't cut her out of the loop as they did after her sister first went missing.

With your average thriller the ending can sometimes let you down. Iles skillfully avoids this trap and keeps you reading and neatly closes the story with a satisfying conclusion that leaves no questions unanswered.

The main characters are solid and well written and at no point are you jarred into reality with a careless sentence or paragraph that doesn't ring true.

If you like thrillers, or if you are just hunting for a good read, I can't recommend this book enough.

Intriguing and enticing
I have reached a point where i'm struggling to find new - and interesting - authors. I seem to have exhausted those that i know of. So it was with trepidation that i picked up Iles' book as i'd previously never heard of him.
This book was extremely gripping. I was on holiday with relatives at the time and often needed something to pass the time at quiet moments - Dead Sleep did this and more. It's one of those books that you read (if you're anything like me)so quickly - skimming over the sentences in a desperate urge to reach the climax! The characters were believable (great to see a heroine who's believable, likeable but with forgivable flaws) and the plot unpredictable. Now i'm back home the only decision i've got to make is which one of his books to read next.