London Bridges: An Alex Cross Novel (Alex Cross Novels)

Alex Cross is back in his tenth and most explosive adventure yet.

In broad desert daylight, a mysterious platoon of soldiers evacuates the entire population of Sunrise Valley, Nevada. Minutes later, a huge bomb detonates a hundred feet above the ground and lays waste to homes, cars, and playgrounds: a town annihilated in an instant.

And so is the Wolf.

Alex Cross is on vacation in San Francisco with his girlfriend, Jamilla Hughes, when he gets the call. The Russian supercriminal known as the Wolf claims responsibility for the blast. The Wolf is the deadliest nemesis Cross has ever faced, and the fact that he is still at large is agonizing for him and his new bosses at the FBI.

And so is the Weasel.

Major cities around the globe, including London, Paris, and New York, are threatened with total destruction. The Wolf has proven he can do it — the only question is who can stop him in time. Surveillance film of the blast reveals the presence of another of Alex Cross's most dangerous enemies, the ruthless assassin known as the Weasel. The thought of these two dark geniuses joining forces makes Alex's blood run cold.

Now are you scared?

World leaders have just four days to prevent an unimaginable cataclysm. In a matter of hours, Cross is catapulted into an international chase of astonishing danger. Joining forces with Scotland Yard and Interpol, Alex fights his way through a torrent of false leads, impersonators, and foreign agents before he gets close to the heart of the crimes. Racing down the hairpin turns of the Riviera in the most unforgettable finale James Patterson has ever written, Alex Cross confronts the truth of the Wolf's identity — a revelation that even Cross himself may be unable to survive.

"Any thriller writer, wannabe or actual, would do well to study Patterson's 10th Alex Cross novel. A sequel to last year's The Big Bad Wolf, the book is a model of economy, delivering a full package of suspense, emotion and characterization in a minimum number of words. The story brings back not only Big Bad Wolf's arch-villain, the Russian mobster known as the Wolf, but also an earlier Patterson bad guy, the Weasel, recruited by the Wolf to further his plans. These involve extorting Western powers for billions of dollars to avoid major terrorist attacks on New York, London, Washington and Frankfurt — attacks the Wolf offers a preview of by wiping out a town in Nevada by aerial bombardment after hustling its citizens to safety, then by doing the same to a village in England without evacuating the populace. The novel features numerous exciting scenes, most notably one in which Cross is kidnapped, then shackled to a suitcase atomic bomb. It's not the steady tension, the numerous colorful locales, the reliable action climaxes nor the novel's effective doomsday gloss that makes this thriller work so well, though. It is, of course, the characters, and in Cross, Patterson continues to elaborate his finest hero, cerebral yet emotional, dedicated yet flawed, caught between duty and family. Regrettably, the novel is marred in its final chapters by a series of surprises that skirt playing unfair with the reader, but most Patterson fans probably won't mind and they are legion enough to send this to the top of the charts, for good reason." Publishers Weekly (Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information, Inc.)

This is the tenth Alex Cross thriller, a series that "remains Patterson's finest" (Publishers Weekly). Morgan Freeman brought Alex Cross to on-screen life in Along Came a Spider (2001) and Kiss the Girls (1997), and production for Roses Are Red is set to begin this year.

Alex Cross is back — and so is the Big Bad Wolf.

Terrorists have seized the world's largest cities. London, Washington, D.C., New York, and Frankfurt will be destroyed, unless their demands are met — and their demands are impossible. After a city in the western United States is fire bombed — a practice run — Alex Cross knows that it is only a matter of time before the bombers threats to the other cities are brutally executed.

Heading up the investigation by the FBI, CIA, and Interpol, Alex Cross is stunned when surveillance photos show Geoffrey Shafer, the Weasel, near one of the bombing sites. He senses the presence of the Wolf as well, the most vicious predator he has ever battled. With millions of lives in the balance, Cross has to see if the most powerful law enforcement agencies in the world can stay ahead of these two men's cunning.

James Patterson's most recent major international bestseller is 3rd Degree. He is the author of 27 books and lives in Florida.