Product Description

When Evan Delaney’s father disappears, the cops think he’s fled the country to avoid prosecution. But Evan is sure that Phil has been abducted or killed for reasons associated with his work for Naval Intelligence.

As Evan hunts for clues, she is attacked by an armed man. The attacker ends up dead – and turns out to be a federal agent. Now Evan is on the run, implicated in his murder. Then she is contacted by a sinister duo – a Madam and gigolo mother-and-son-team who claim that Phil was mixed up in their very dirty business.

Can Evan save her father’s reputation – and his life? And can Jesse save Evan? Time is running out ...

---

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #359469 in Books
• Published on: 2007-05-31
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 352 pages

Review

'She is up there with Michael Connelly and Lee Child.'

(Stephen King )

'The feisty Evan Delaney makes a welcome return in KILL CHAIN . . . As ever, the plot is pacy and tight.' (Sunday Express )

'Page-turning terror' (Belfast Telegraph )

'Gardiner's prose is cool' (Telegraph )

'A rattling good read' (News of the World )

'The action is high octane from the first page . . . Meg Gardiner is a class act at the top of her game. Once you pick it up, it's a very hard book to put down.' (My Weekly )

'Gardiner is brilliant at making the over-the-top seem utterly convincing. Her heroine, Evan Delaney, is a paragon for our times: tough, funny, clever, brave, tireless and compassionate . . . The pace and inventiveness never flag, and the climax . . . is both nailbiting and moving. But the brilliant writing is what puts this thriller way ahead of the competition . . . Reading the fifth Evan Delaney book first is not a problem, but you'll probably want to go back and read the others. Intelligent escapism at its best.' (Guardian )

'I have a bone to pick with Kill Chain, and by extension, with its author, Meg Gardiner: it was over too damn fast! I couldn't stop reading it, and when it was done, I wanted more. The book starts at a dead run from page one and doesn't stop until you collapse across the finish line. All things in moderation, but that doesn't apply to Meg Gardiner. One of my new favorite authors.' (Cody Mcfadyen )

About the Author
Originally from Santa Barbara, California, Meg Gardiner previously practised law and taught at the University of California. She lives with her family near London. To find out more about her novels, visit Meg's website at www.meggardiner.com

---

Customer Reviews

Keepin it real!
When Evan Delaney's father goes missing hours after leaving her home, she finds herself thrown into a world of hookers, assassins and double crosses. As she struggles to gather information that will help save her father, she must fight to clear her name while trying to discover who is behind the attempts on her life.

Kill Chain is a great read, a book that starts slow but steadily builds up momentum until it speeds along with such furious pace that you can't let go. Towards the end you'll find yourself pushing for `just one more chapter' before you turn the light off.
As Evan, our heroine, travels the globe in search of answers, we discover just how real she is. She doesn't know kung-fu, drive fast cars or walk around shooting the bad guys. Instead she deals with the situation as you or I would. She's normal and believable, helping the reader feel for her in her most desperate situations.

Although this is the fifth in a series, nothing felt like it was missing thanks to Meg Gardiner filling in the required blanks. In fact, these flashes of past stories that make you want to go back and explore Evan's past.

Kill Chain is a story about how far we'll go to protect our loved ones and what we must sacrifice to do this. Anyone who loves reading adventure will enjoy Kill Chain.

Putting Life on Hold
Putting life on hold...that's what Evan Delaney does in this latest thriller from Meg Gardiner. It's also what you'll do once you pick up the book. Once snared, it's hard to get free as you jet around the globe with Evan in a race against time.
Lives are at risk, lives are lost, baddies abound (real baddies, not just paper-mache cutouts), and Evan finds that the world she knew is not reality...at least not where her father is concerned.
Battling the clock and her own uncertainties, finding that she must hide from the bad guys, the good guys, and Jesse...Evan must put it all on the line to survive.
As an avid reader of the Evan Delaney thrillers, I find this to be the best adventure yet. I'm delighted to see the story expanded onto a broader canvas. Much as I love Santa Barbara, Evan's hometown, I enjoy seeing her racing around the globe even more.
Gardiner's writing is vivid and relentlessly taut.
Fasten your seatbelts -- yet again!

The times, they are a-changin'...
"Kill Chain", the fifth book in Meg Gardiner's series featuring Evan Delaney, establishes beyond question the legs for many more stories with these characters and offers up fresh possibilities at a point where many series often come unstuck. Gardiner's thrillers are tough, honest and heartfelt, and the severe emotional kicking that was the second half of "Crosscut" marked an increased maturity in both her writing and the issues her books confront - a maturity that is carried over to "Kill Chain" from the very first page: you are left in no doubt from the offset that things are going to change.

This is at heart a good old-fashioned race-against-time thriller that starts you off at a run and builds an almost irresistible momentum as it tears through its various mysteries and locations on the way to a tense and surprising showdown. Gardiner sidesteps the potential flaw of rendering her travelogue virtually irrelevant in this rush by exploring the locations in conjunction with the plot, making them a key part of proceedings rather than simply trying to distract us with new scenery. From the streets of Bangkok to a terrific sequence on the London Underground, she amps up the intrigue with a keen eye for her settings and a barrage of thrills, including what is probably the most nonchalant use of a chair as a weapon ever written.

Gardiner is a writer of great talent, filling proceedings with the kind of emotional richness that really marks her books out for me, and reminding us of the humanity and fallibility of her characters with effortless asides. She also juggles the various story elements - among them the imminent sense of threat throughout, an at times literal countdown and the changing emotional commitments of various characters - with consummate skill, and is not afraid to leave certain things hanging come the end (in a move that left me itching for the next one, so I hope she gets to it before too long!).

So, why not five stars? Well, I've come to expect great things of Ms. Gardiner after her last three books, and this can feel almost a little too convenient in places. The importance of this book in the context of the series is indisputable, and it is expertly paced and marshalled throughout, but I would now like to see Gardiner's writing shift up to the next level of which she is so clearly capable. I'd easily put this up against anything else being written today, and urge anyone who has yet to read Gardiner's books to start as soon as possible.