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True Evil

by Greg Iles

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ISBN13: 9781416524533
ISBN10: 1416524533
Condition: Standard
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Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

True evil has a face you know and a voice you trust...

A Southern doctor is pulled into a terrifying ring of murderous secrets in this powerhouse thriller from New York Times bestselling author Greg Iles.

Dr. Chris Shepard has never seen his new patient before. But the attractive young woman with the scarred face knows him all too well. An FBI agent working undercover, Alex Morse has come to Dr. Shepard's office in Natchez, Mississippi, to unmask a killer. A local divorce attorney has a cluster of clients whose spouses have all died under mysterious circumstances. Agent Morse's own brother-in-law was one of those clients, and now her beloved sister is dead. Then comes Morse's bombshell: Dr. Shepard's own beautiful wife consulted this lawyer one week ago, a visit Shepard knew nothing about. Will he help Alex Morse catch a killer? Or is he the next one to fall victim to a deadly trap of sex, lies, and murder?

Review:

"Smooth prose, psychological depth and crafty plotting lift bestseller Iles's latest suspense thriller, which puts a fresh twist on a familiar theme — the cat-and-mouse game between an FBI agent and a fiendishly-clever serial killer. One personal tragedy after another has struck Alexandra Morse, a rising star in the FBI who specializes in hostage negotiation: her father's shooting death in a robbery, her mother's diagnosis of advanced ovarian cancer, and a misstep on the job that left her face scarred and a fellow agent dead. Now Alex's sister, Grace, lies dying in a Jackson, Miss., hospital after suffering a stroke. Alex arrives from Washington just in time to hear Grace say that her husband has murdered her. After Grace's death, Alex learns that Dr. Eldon Tarver, a brilliant scientist in need of funds for research into developing a biological superweapon, has teamed with a Mississippi divorce attorney who offers select clients the opportunity to avoid a protracted court fight by arranging for their spouses to die. When Alex identifies the next intended victim, Dr. Chris Shepard, she goes undercover as one of the idealistic doctor's patients and soon finds herself in a race against Tarver as well as her own superiors, who have not sanctioned her investigation. This pulse-pounder is sure to be another bestseller for Iles (Turning Angel)." Publishers Weekly (Starred Review)

Review:

"With the two most recent of his novels, Greg Iles has shown that he's among the most talented and ambitious of contemporary thriller writers. The two — last year's best-selling 'Turning Angel' and his new 'True Evil' — are both set in Mississippi, where Iles lives, and both emphasize place and character, but they are miles apart in concept.

'Turning Angel' focused on the ill-fated romance... Washington Post Book Review (read the entire Washington Post review) of a 40ish society doctor and a sophisticated girl of 18, set against a panorama of abundant sex and drugs. It was an alarming portrait of today's youth, but its characters were more or less normal upper-middle-class Americans. It's a story that might have been written by a latter-day John O'Hara who had turned his attention to 21st-century Southern decadence. But 'True Evil,' as its title suggests, is something else. It conjures monsters. It's scary, Gothic and sometimes over the top. Iles isn't as original as Thomas Harris, whose mad genius is incomparable, but the novel's more horrific moments reminded me of 'The Silence of the Lambs' and 'Hannibal.'

We start with FBI Special Agent Alex Morse, whose world has collapsed. Her ex-cop father was killed during a holdup, and her mother is dying of cancer. Although she's a brilliant hostage negotiator, Alex has bungled an encounter, leaving her face scarred by buckshot and glass, and her soul scarred as well. On top of all this, she is summoned home to Jackson, where her beloved sister has suffered a stroke. Moments before dying, the sister whispers that her husband has killed her. The husband is a rich, arrogant developer, and Alex does not doubt her sister's charge, so she sets out to prove his guilt and free her young nephew from his custody. Soon, acting without FBI approval, she has gathered evidence of a sinister plot. She learns that her brother-in-law and eight other wealthy individuals whose spouses died unexpectedly all had suspicious financial dealings with the same Jackson divorce lawyer. She begins to suspect — correctly — that the lawyer has persuaded the people that he can end their marriages in a less costly way than divorce: For a price, he will have their spouses killed with impunity.

The lawyer is loathsome, but the true evil emanates from his partner, the Southern-fried psychopath Dr. Eldon Tarver, a brilliant scientist who has learned how to induce both cancer and strokes in people in ways that cannot be detected. The men's scheme — divorce by murder — is both cynical and lurid in the extreme, but Iles develops his characters, and the medical details, with such care that it becomes plausible. The huge, bearded Tarver is also a serious student of lethal snakes that he sometimes uses to terrorize or kill those who oppose him — and he himself kills as coldly as any coral snake or cottonmouth. Another element of his madness is that he's a patriot, a kind of global Darwinist who sees war with China as inevitable and is therefore developing a killer virus that his patrons in government will use to wipe out China before they nuke us. The serial killings are simply the way he finances his contribution to national security.

Alex Morse teams up with a good-guy doctor whose rich, sexy, bored wife has targeted him for death — and who, in the course of the novel, is made to be violently ill. Alex is fired by the FBI for her one-woman crusade and becomes a rogue agent, out there on her own, but Iles makes her, and her love for the nephew she is determined to save, entirely believable. He nicely balances the book's monsters with the decent people who nurse their dying mothers and coach their children's Little League teams. Iles takes his title from the saying that 'True evil has a face you know and a voice you trust,' and demonstrates its truth.

The novel leads, inevitably, to a showdown between the FBI agent who is fueled by love and the scientist who burns with malice. It's a wham-bam ending that features snakes, SWAT teams, helicopters, speedboats, government assassins and heroic sacrifice, all with a child's life in the balance. 'True Evil' will be too dark for some readers, but for those who enjoy lush, full-tilt thrillers, it will be engrossing and fun." Reviewed by Patrick Anderson, whose e-mail address is mondaythrillers(at symbol)aol.com, Washington Post Book World (Copyright 2006 Washington Post Book World Service/Washington Post Writers Group)
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Review:

"Iles doesn't merely use suspense. He makes the suspense come to life by creating a compelling story line and drawing characters that are multidimensional, possessing real depth and feeling....[A] must read not only for fans of Iles, but also for anyone who enjoys an appealing psychological thriller." Philadelphia Inquirer

Review:

"[A] fascinating novel. Greg Iles takes his time letting the various plot lines neatly coalesce and offers a coherent conclusion. The characters are perfectly cast in their roles, and readers get to hate the bad guys and cheer for the good ones." BookReporter.com

Review:

"True Evil begins in promising enough fashion, but Iles sends his story ricocheting in a dizzying manner, piling on unnecessary subplots along the way....As a fan of Iles' previous work, I hope he takes more time — and care — with his next book. (Grade: C)" Entertainment Weekly

Review:

"Before you know it, you've reached the last page, and you're all out of breath — but you've had one hell of a ride. Plot-driven is too often used as a pejorative term; Iles shows the other side." Booklist

Synopsis:

New York Times bestselling author Greg Iles returns with this smart and atmospheric work. Dr. Chris Shepard, a busy young doctor in Natchez, Mississippi, has never seen his new patient Alex Morse before. But the attractive young woman with the scarred face has come to Dr. Shepard's office on a mission to rip his idyllic life inside out.

Synopsis:

Dr. Chris Shepard, a busy young doctor in Natchez, Mississippi, has never seen his new patient Alex Morse before. But the attractive young woman with the scarred face has come to Dr. Shepards office on a mission to catch a killer. This New York Times bestseller is available in a tall Premium Edition.

About the Author

Greg Iles was born in 1960 in Germany. He founded the band Frankly Scarlet, plays guitar for the Rock Bottom Remainders, and is the New York Times bestselling author of nine novels, including Blood Memory and 24 Hours. He lives in Natchez, Mississippi.

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Average customer rating based on 1 comment:

: Laura VanMarter, November 3, 2007 (view all comments by Laura VanMarter)
I learned of this author through a friend who worked for a time in Natchez, MS, the place where many of Iles stories take place in and around. Iles is a very good story teller and I read this particular book while flying recently. It starts off quickly so it grabs your attention, and its an easy read from there! The plot was fresh and didn't give me that deja vu feeling you sometimes get when you read a lot in the same genre.

I had only read one other book by Iles previously and was very happy to find out after reading the 2nd that my first exposure wasn't a fluke. If you like James Patterson, you'll very much like Greg Iles. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go shopping for my next book ;)
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Product Details

ISBN:: 9781416524533
Author:: Iles, Greg
Publisher:: Pocket Books
Subject:: Thrillers
Subject:: Suspense
Edition Description:: Tall paperback
Publication Date:: September 2007
Binding:: Mass Market Paperbound
Grade Level:: General/trade
Language:: English
Pages:: 640
Dimensions:: 7.5 x 4.125 in

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