The Collectors [Hardcover]

David Baldacci (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 18, 2006

People are dropping dead in Washington, D.C., and the Camel Club must unravel a secret that threatens to bring America to its knees. In "The Collectors," #1 "New York Times" bestselling author Baldacci once again demonstrates why he is one of the world's favorite writers.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In bestseller Baldacci's entertaining if overly long sequel to The Camel Club (2005), renegade CIA agent Roger Seagraves has set himself up in the business of freelance assassination and selling our country's secrets to the highest bidder. The Camel Club, a group of four dysfunctional crime solvers headed by ex-CIA assassin Caleb Shaw, becomes involved with Seagraves through a killing at the Library of Congress, where one of the club members works. Meanwhile, an enigmatic young woman, Annabelle Conroy, is assembling a team to engineer a "long con," a $33 million scam targeting Jerry Bagger, the sleazy owner of an Atlantic City casino. This time around, Baldacci wisely tones down the wackiness of the club members, focusing instead on bringing Seagraves to justice while Annabelle works her ingenious scam. The splicing of the two plots is problematic, but Baldacci sacrifices a bit of believability to cobble together a new cast of characters destined to continue fighting the forces of evil in the next installment. (Oct.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

The four disillusioned, aging gentlemen featured in Baldacci's 2005 best-seller, The Camel Club, are back in this engaging offering. The ringleader of the eccentric Washington, D.C., group (comprising obsessive-compulsive computer-whiz Milton Farb, decorated Vietnam vet Rueben Rhodes, and slightly rumpled library-scholar Caleb Shaw) is an ex-CIA conspiracy theorist who goes by the pseudonym Oliver Stone. All are reunited when Shaw's boss, the Library of Congress' director of Rare Books and Special Collections, is found dead. (Might he have been killed for possession of a rare collection of Puritan psalms?) Meanwhile, a few hundred miles away, sexy scam artist Annabelle Conroy avenges her mother's death with a fiendishly clever con pulled on a nefarious Atlantic City casino magnate. Though his two plots converge in a rather contrived way, Baldacci delivers crisp, economical prose and a cast of spies, misfits, and assassins that would make even the most patriotic citizen question the American political system. The best of the characters include gorgeous, gutsy newcomer Annabelle and the wonderfully idiosyncratic Stone, who spends many a day camped out on the lawn across from the White House with a sign that says, "I want the truth." Allison Block
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 438 pages
• Publisher: Grand Central Publishing; 1 edition (October 18, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 044653109X
• ISBN-13: 978-0446531092
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (194 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #145,119 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

David Baldacci was born in Virginia, in 1960, where he currently resides. He received a Bachelor of Arts in political science from Virginia Commonwealth University and a law degree from the University of Virginia. Mr. Baldacci practiced law for nine years in Washington, D.C., as both a trial and corporate attorney.
David Baldacci has published seventeen novels: Absolute Power, Total Control, The Winner, The Simple Truth, Saving Faith, Wish You Well, Last Man Standing, The Christmas Train, Split Second, Hour Game, The Camel Club, The Collectors, Simple Genius, Stone Cold, and The Whole Truth; and in his young adult series, Freddy and the French Fries: Fries Alive! and Freddy and the French Fries: The Adventures of Silas Finklebean. He has also published a novella for the Dutch entitled Office Hours, written for Holland's Year 2000 "Month of the Thriller." Baldacci authored a short story, "The Mighty Johns," as part of a mystery anthology published in 2002.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

82 of 90 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Enjoyable, but not his strongest effort..., November 26, 2006

By 

Cynthia K. Robertson (beverly, new jersey USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Collectors (Hardcover)

It wouldn't be October without the publication of a new David Baldacci thriller, and The Collectors is his latest for 2007. While I enjoyed The Collectors, I don't think it is his strongest effort.

The Collectors is actually two stories. In the first, the Speaker of the House and a curator at the Library of Congress are both murdered (the second is made to look like natural causes). Caleb Shaw is a librarian at the Library of Congress, and he is also a member of the Camel Club (introduced in the book by the same name). The Camel Club consists of four misfits (nearing senior citizen status) who form a secret conspiracy watchdog organization. They decide to investigate the deaths and immediately, they discover they're being followed by agents who could be FBI, CIA or NSA. The subplot involves four individual cons who launch a scheme to swindle an Atlantic City casino owner out of $30 million. The ringleader, Annabelle Conroy, becomes immersed in the Camel Club's investigation when she attends the funeral of the library curator. The closer they come to the truth, the more endangered their lives become.

All thrillers have a bit of disbelief in their stories, and The Collectors is no exception. I don't think Baldacci was on top of his game with The Collectors in terms of plot development. Plus, the ending never really resolves all the questions and is just an opening for a sequel. While good, it doesn't come close to his earlier works including Absolute Power and A Simple Truth.

92 of 109 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Perhaps Baldacci's Best Yet. Sit Back and Enjoy This One!, October 17, 2006

By 

Peter Thomas Senese - Author. ""A book is... (Los Angeles, California) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Collectors (Hardcover)

David Baldacci's ensemble of fascinating and brilliantly created characters in `The Collectors' coupled with two intertwining plots of murder and a clever financial con make for a completely enjoyable and page-turning read. Following his best selling hit `The Camel Club' with some familiar faces and the addition of the sultry yet incorrigibly scandalous Annabelle Conroy, readers will be continually amused and entertained as Baldacci, as if a grand maestro, intertwines and blends the character action and movement with such ease and storyline pleasure. As usual and expected in Baldacci's novels, readers will be left turning the pages, in this case as the plot moves to a very interesting conclusion when the World of Washington politics and those involved with a long-term swindle are forced to collide. Folks, sit back and enjoy `The Collectors', it very well may be David Baldacci's best yet.

17 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Poor Effort, December 16, 2006

By 

Carl F. Mclaren Jr. (Haines City, Florida USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Collectors (Hardcover)

I don't usually write negative reviews but I will make an exception here. I enjoy reading stories where intelligent people do intelligent things, but in this tome the characters do one stupid thing after another. For example, the beautiful super con lady is in a restaurant when she notices a man looking at her. She goes to a table where some men she has never seen before are eating and tells them she wants to practice a movie plot and wants them to act like Mafioso. Then she goes to the man staring at her and makes a big scene threatening him with the other men. Are you kidding me, that is the last thing a con women would do plus it is a completely unbelievable scenario. In another part her genius cohort who dropped out of MIT due to boredom makes a mistake in a bank con that a five year old wouldn't make. Next her team cons a casino owner out of millions in a way that could never happen. The other plot starts with the murder of the speaker of the house which is similar to murdering the president but here it is treated like no biggie. Please. If you want to read something good try Michael Connelly or Daniel Silva.