Cold Springs [Mass Market Paperback]

Rick Riordan (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 2, 2004

The Edgar, Shamus, and Anthony award-winning Rick Riordan delivers a spellbinding novel of a man on an edge so extreme that his fall will destroy not only him—but all that he holds dear.

Cold Springs

Chadwick’s life was balanced on a knife’s edge—his career, his marriage, his relationship with his dangerously troubled daughter. And then one autumn night, the worst possible thing happened….

Now, a decade later, Chadwick’s heart is on the mend. Working for an old military buddy, he saves kids for a living, escorting troubled teens to a Texas wilderness school that specializes in the toughest brand of love.

Until he gets a phone call that threatens to shatter his new life.

Mallory Zedman is taking the same terrible path Chadwick’s own daughter once took. Defiant and out of control, Mallory is determined to destroy herself and anyone who tries to stop her. No sooner does Chadwick snatch her off the streets than he discovers she is wanted for questioning in a brutal murder—a slaying that seems directly linked to Chadwick’s past.To save Mallory, tough love will not be enough. Chadwick must find the truth behind the murder—and in doing so revisit the infidelities, shattered promises, and violent passions that cracked his world apart. And he must jeopardize the one thing he still has left to lose—a slim hope of redemption.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Aptly subtitled "A Novel of Secrets," this dark, probing tale examines the destructive ripple effects of a child's death on those around her--especially after doubts arise whether it was accident, suicide, or murder. In the harrowing opening pages, 16-year-old Katherine Chadwick ODs on heroin while babysitting little Mallory, daughter of her parents' best friends. Then the tale leaps forward nine years: both couples' marriages are in ruins; Katherine's father, once a schoolteacher, is now a bruising "escort" for a reform school in the Texas outback called Cold Springs; and his next assignment is to capture none other than Mallory, now 15 and in trouble.

Texas native Riordan, whose Tres Navarre series has earned acclaim and awards, evokes the landscapes around Cold Springs with vividness and authority, and also brings that sensibility to the book's Bay Area scenes:

Chadwick ... stepped out into the growing gloom of the evening. Down the block, he could hear the lowrider cruising, its stereo setting off car alarms all across the neighborhood like a bloodhound flushing quail.

But it's the book's complex plot and richly realized people--most notably its troubled teenagers (Riordan is a middle-school teacher)--that give Cold Springs substance and heft. You may need to persist through some tangled exposition in the first 75 pages or so, but the payoff is well worth it. The long climax offers a stunning series of cascading revelations, including a final kicker that changes everything. Riordan is the real deal. --Nicholas H. Allison --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Publishers Weekly

Riordan is a middle-school teacher in San Antonio, which explains why this unorthodox suspense novel-Riordan's first break from his Edgar-, Shamus- and Anthony-winning series about private detective Tres Navarre (The Devil Went Down to Austin, etc.)-centers around two very different kinds of schools. One is Laurel Heights, a private middle school in San Francisco, where a dedicated staff deals with the needs of the privileged children of the affluent. The other is Cold Springs, a survival school in the mountain country of Texas, where a former army Ranger rescues teenagers who have slipped over the edge. Linking the two schools is Chadwick, a huge man who looks like George Washington; he teaches history at Laurel Heights and then becomes an escort at Cold Springs (run by his old Vietnam buddy) when his own teenaged daughter, Katherine, dies of a drug overdose. Chadwick, who blames himself for Katherine's death (he was about to leave his wife for Ann Zedman, the woman who runs Laurel Heights), is a complex and interesting character, and the pressures on him are believable and absorbing-especially when Ann's daughter, Mallory, becomes a Cold Springs candidate. Riordan tilts the playing field by introducing a truly dysfunctional family, the Montroses, and tracing a string of murders related to Katherine's death. Knife-throwing, wild shooting and hairbreadth escapes up the ante, sometimes to the point of overkill, but Riordan is so good at moving his story along-and showing how fragile children's lives can be-that most readers will forgive him his excesses.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 416 pages
• Publisher: Bantam (March 2, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0553579975
• ISBN-13: 978-0553579970
• Product Dimensions: 4.2 x 1.2 x 6.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (20 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #403,517 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Rick Riordan is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series, the Kane Chronicles, and the Heroes of Olympus. He is also the author of the multi-award-winning Tres Navarre mystery series for adults.

For fifteen years, Rick taught English and history at public and private middle schools in the San Francisco Bay Area and in Texas. In 2002, Saint Mary's Hall honored him with the school's first Master Teacher Award.

While teaching full time, Riordan began writing mystery novels for grownups. His Tres Navarre series went on to win the top three national awards in the mystery genre - the Edgar, the Anthony and the Shamus. Riordan turned to children's fiction when he started The Lightning Thief as a bedtime story for his oldest son.

Today over 30 million copies of his Percy Jackson, Kane Chronicles, and Heroes of Olympus books are in print in the United States, and rights have been sold into more than 35 countries. Rick is also the author of The 39 Clues: The Maze of Bones, another #1 New York Times bestseller. In 2011, Rick received the Children's Choice Book Award for Author of the Year.

Rick Riordan now writes full-time. He lives in San Antonio with his wife and two sons.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Don't stop reading. Don't relax., May 31, 2003

By 

Andrew S. Rogers (Stamford, Connecticut) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Cold Springs (Hardcover)

I really like Rick Riordan's Tres Navarre books. Tres is a great guy and a great character. Even in the deepest mysteries or most desperate straits, he always strikes me as someone who's basically in control, and a fun guy to hang out with.

The characters in "Cold Springs" aren't like that.

If the Navarre stories are fast-paced and entertaining, "Cold Springs" is edgy and uncomfortable. All of the characters are tense and troubled. All their lives are dark and desperate. And with one or two exceptions, none of them were ultimately particularly easy to be around. Even Chadwick, our hero, is battling too many demons ever to feel comfortable with. In fact, I never felt comfortable in this story at all, never able to relax, and never certain about what might be around the next corner.

I loved it.

"Cold Springs" has all the intricate plotting we've come to expect from Rick Riordan. Suspicion points at one character, and then another. Nobody seems trustworthy, not even our hero. But when you finally reach the resolution, most everything falls into place. As you read this, keep in mind the subtitle on the front cover: "A Novel of Secrets." Secrets are always being revealed -- right up to the very end.

Riordan's plot is complex and winding, but his characterizations deserve praise too. As I read this, I was reminded of Tolstoy's famous opening line, "All happy families are alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." Here, every miserable, troubled person is miserable and troubled in his or her own way, and each of them, including the several teenagers, is true to life (or at least convincing to someone like me who has mercifully avoided that kind of misery in my own life). And unlike the Navarre books, this story is told in third-person, and from multiple viewpoints. Riordan thus not only had to create characters whose actions are believable, but whose thoughts and emotions are believable too. That's much harder to do, and my hat's off to him because I think he pulled it off.

Rick Riordan has done a great job. He's one of the few authors, and certainly the only novelist, for whose next work I'm always impatient. Though "Cold Springs" paid off the wait, it also whet my appetite for whatever's coming next. But first, I need to sit back and let the tension ease out a little bit. This was a nerve-wracking ride, and I think I need a rest.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Another Great Riordan Read, May 8, 2003

By 

Cowboy on the Ocean (West Texas Native) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Cold Springs (Hardcover)

WOW!! Riordan has done it again. I was skeptical at first to get Cold Springs, Riordan's first book away from the Tres Navarre series. However, now having read Cold Springs, I feel that it may be Riordan's best book to date. Once you pick it up you won't want to put it down. If you like Rick Riordan's previous books or are just looking for a good suspense/thiller novel then get this book!

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wow!, July 9, 2004

By 

"eparkm" (VA, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Cold Springs (Mass Market Paperback)

I'm a big fan of the Riordan's mystery series, and don't usually like stand-alone thrillers. This book is different. It's one of the best reads I've picked up in a long time. I don't buy many books (usually preferring library checkouts), but had to buy this one, and surprisingly it was completely worth it. I couldn't put it down towards the end. The characters are believable and sympathetic; the story compelling. And best of all, it kept me guessing throughout with some questions answered all along the way. Highly recommended!