The Bombmaker [Audiobook, Unabridged] [Audio Cassette]

Stephen Leather (Author), Sean Barrett (Narrator)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 2001

Andrea Hayes was one of the IRA’s deadliest killers—until a misplaced bomb ripped into a group of passing children. Now, years later, she has a whole new life and a family, and her days of violence seem a distant memory. But then her daughter is kidnapped by persons unknown, and she’s blackmailed into building a massive explosive device for them—target unknown.

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Stephen Leather should be nestling in your bookshelves alongside Frederick Forsyth and Jack Higgins." -- Daily Mail

"This is as high-tech and world-class as the thriller genre gets." -- Express on Sunday --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

From the Publisher

Andrea Hayes was one of the IRA's deadliest killers—until a misplaced bomb ripped into a group of passing children. Now, years later, she has a whole new life and a family, and her days of violence seem a distant memory. But then her daughter is kidnapped by persons unknown, and she's blackmailed into building a massive explosive device for them—target unknown... The Bombmaker is Stephen Leather at his best, taking the reader from Dublin, to London, to the depths of the Far East. Stephen Leather is a former journalist for THE TIMES and Hong Kong's SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST. His many books include Eyewitness, The Stretch, The Vets, and Tango One. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Audio Cassette
• Publisher: Isis Audio; Unabridged edition (December 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0753109247
• ISBN-13: 978-0753109243
• Product Dimensions: 9.8 x 7 x 2.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #10,463,153 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Stephen Leather was a journalist for more than ten years on newspapers such as The Times, the Daily Mail and the South China Morning Post in Hong Kong. Before that, he was employed as a biochemist for ICI, shovelled limestone in a quarry, worked as a baker, a petrol pump attendant, a barman, and worked for the Inland Revenue. He began writing full time in 1992. His bestsellers have been translated into more than ten languages. He has also written for television shows such as London's Burning, The Knock and the BBC's Murder in Mind series. You can find out more from his website, www.stephenleather.com.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A good, tense thriller, July 6, 2002

By 

harsil (Toronto, Ontario, Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Bombmaker (Audio Cassette)

Odd that this author is basically non-existent in the US. The Bombmaker is a tense thriller that starts off just a tad slow but that steadily cranks up the tension until you find yourself unwilling to put it down until you finish it. Perhaps the best thing about it is its convincing portrayal of the workings of a Secret Service and the way it goes about preventing a terrorist act. I found the book quite interesting in this respect. While the characters are a bit two-dimensional, the plotting is excellent, and the book is a good, easy, tension-filled read.

3.0 out of 5 stars A tough thriller, September 27, 2007

By 

HORAK (Zug, Switzerland) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Bombmaker (Paperback)

In her younger and politically naïve student years, Andrea Hayes made bombs for the IRA, ones that were designed to wreck buildings not people in order to create chaos not murder.
Andy has moved to Dublin and re-invented herself as a loyal wife and the doting mother of seven-year-old Katie. And then the daughter is kidnapped.
Soon the note arrives that in exchange for the girl, she has to do IT again. Return to Semtex, to that most unforgiving craft of explosives and mayhem: she will have to build a four thousand pounds bomb in exchange for Katie...
Good suspense otherwise nothing else. The book is read by Séan Barret for ISIS audiobooks. A nice performance.

5.0 out of 5 stars A little girl's promise kept, August 14, 2005

By 

Joseph Haschka (Glendale, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: The Bombmaker (Paperback)

What would happen if two tons of fertilizer hit the fan?

During the first hundred pages of THE BOMBMAKER, one learns that four otherwise respectable Beijing Chinese - a general, two bankers, and a relative of former Communist Party First Secretary Deng Xiaoping - want to blow a bloody big hole in the center of London's financial district. Why isn't immediately apparent. Maybe they'd encountered a snippy foreign exchange teller on their last visit to The City. To work out the details, they employ a mysterious killer-for-hire named Egan, who coerces a former IRA bombmaker, Andrea Hayes, to construct the explosive device by kidnapping her young daughter, Katie. In the bad old days, Andrea specialized in fertilizer bombs, but gave up that line of work after accidently killing four young boys and maiming a fifth. For years, she's lived with her husband, Martin, who knows nothing of her past.

THE BOMBMAKER is such a first rate knuckle-biter that the unspecified reason for the plot, though eventually revealed, recedes into the background and the reader is left to fear for Katie in her basement prison, to empathize with Andrea confronting the repercussions of past notoriety and four-thousand pounds of smelly Bandini, and sympathize with Martin left alone, frantic, and without a clue. And it only gets better when MI5 finally gets dropped into the plot's mix.

The high-tension ending should leave even the most jaded of thriller readers satisfied. Oddly, however, it's spunky Katie's last act that prompted me to award 5 stars, even though she's given relatively little exposure in the overall story. Because of her, I ended up liking this book enormously. Cross my heart and swear to die.