Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #731909 in Books
• Published on: 2002-06-05
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 464 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
Last Man Standing has the essential elements of a terrific David Baldacci novel: a tough but tender-hearted hero, dirty dealings in the nation's bureaucracy and a roller-coaster plot. Web London, a member of the FBI's Hostage Rescue Team, froze up on a drug raid and thus became the sole survivor of a remote-controlled ambush that killed six of his compatriots. Now the only witness has disappeared and the inside man on the botched raid has gone underground.

As a pretty psychiatrist puzzles over the corners of Web's brain that kept him alive, Web himself stays on the move. He's certain that the ambush is connected to the prison escape of a neofascist leader, Ernest B Free, whom he helped arrest five years earlier, and a series of new murders leads him to a Virginia horse farm and the driving force behind all the carnage. It may seem as though Baldacci gives away the mastermind too soon, but both the bad guys and the good guys are complex enough that there's plenty of punch all the way to the last page. --Barrie Trinkle, Amazon.com

Synopsis
A brilliant new action adventure from one of the world's leading thriller writers. When his hostage rescue team is wiped out in a brutal set-up, Web London is the last man standing. Now he just has to keep it that way...It took seven seconds for Web London to lose everything: his friends, his team, his reputation. Point man of the FBI's super-elite Hostage Rescue Team, Web roared into a blind alley toward a drug leader's lair, only to meet a high-tech, custom-designed ambush that killed everyone around him. Now coping with the blame-filled words of anguished widows and the suspicions of colleagues, Web tries to put his life back together. To do so, he must discover why he was the one man who lived through the ambush - and find the only other person who came out of the alley alive...a ten-year-old boy who has since disappeared. Last Man Standing is an explosive psychological thriller about a man desperate to find answers - from the secret terrors he has kept for himself to his unbearable guilt. His fight to save himself and those he cares for will come at a high cost...and threaten everything he has grown to believe in.

With vividly realized characters and a breathtaking pace, this is another spellbinding novel from David Baldacci, one of today's best storytellers.

Customer Reviews

BALDACCI IS BACK ... AND TO HIS THRILLING BEST!
I made the (perhaps understandable) mistake of reading Baldacci's last novel, "Wish You Well", which was not a thriller, but a family saga, and I read it because I was a big fan of his earlier work (particularly Absolute Power and Total Control). Wish You Well, was well, tedious - "Last Man Standing" ROCKS all the way to the stunning ending. Baldacci is back!

So what's this one about? Our hero, Web London, the best of the best in the Hostage Rescue Team, chokes on an op, leaving his men dead. But why did he freeze? And who was behind the massacre? Stir in a love-interest, a sexy psychiatrist who can get into your mind and your bed, and some rather evil bad guys. Brew ungently for a few hundred pages, and - voila!

I have two quibbles, small, but things I should let you know. The book seems to me too long @ 550 pages. This is a 400 page novel overpacked with insider research about things covert. Secondly, the hero's name, Web London, bugged me @ first. Web? What's that? And London might sound kool in the US, but for us living in London, it sounds naff.

Small quibbles, these, since this is the best thriller I've read for a while. A couple of books you'll probably like if you're into this genre: Dexter Dias's "Power of Atttorney" - a fine thriller about what happens when witness protection programmes go pear-shaped and murders result. Also, Robert Crais's "Hostage", another HRT story.

Superbly crafted story that twists and twists again!
This is a terrific read, a real novel in the style of a thriller. The characters have plausible depth to them and likewise subject matter expertise is there in abundance, across a variety of areas, to provide a breathing space between the twists and turns of a totally believable plot. ...More importantly this was my first Baldicci book and I'm delighted to have discovered another of the decidedly few authors who can compose and elaborate with style, depth and eloquence.

an action-packed chiller-thriller!
An FBI Agent, point-man on a hostage rescue team, is desperate to find answers to why people connected with him are being silenced.

Last Man Standing, is a techno-thriller minus the jargon; it is an adventure, a fantastic psychological thriller, & Baldacci has convincingly combined the elements of all these sub-genres in an action-packed book.

While the action is not past paced, it is thick & furious. London is a real fallible hero, similar to the protagonists in many Frederick Forsyth novels, which makes the character & the story totally believable.

Web London has many features of a series character, & I wouldn't be surprised to catch him in any future Baldacci novels.

I enjoyed this punching chiller-thriller.