Detour [Unabridged, Audiobook] [Audio Cassette]

James Siegel (Author), Paul Boehmer (Narrator)

Book Description

Publication Date: 2005

When Paul and Joanna come back from Colombia with a baby girl, they are taken prisoner and Paul is given an ultimatum.

Product Details

• Audio Cassette: 7 pages
• Publisher: Books on Tape, Inc.; Unabridged edition (2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1415907781
• ISBN-13: 978-1415907788
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6.3 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (26 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,832,957 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Forget It..., October 18, 2005

By 

Gary Griffiths (Los Altos Hills, CA United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Detour: A Novel (Hardcover)

Forget your job. Your family. Plans for the weekend. Forget it all if you decide to pick up James Siegel's "Detour". Once you start, consider your life on hold till you finish.

Like Siegel's "Derailed" of two years ago, "Detour" is a high adrenaline rush of terror for the ordinary guy who finds his life spinning violently out of control. This life is that of Paul Breidbart, an insurance actuary, and his wife Joanna. Wanting nothing more than to adopt a child, Paul and Joanna find themselves in a nightmare of South American drug cartels, crooked lawyers, and the ubiquitous Russian mobsters seemingly obligatory in pop thrillers. As an actuary, Breidbart views life in probability and risk - a skill that comes in handy as he finds himself facing so many successive steroid-class catastrophes that an alien invasion would not have occurred improbable. Unthinkable brutality and enough twists to qualify the title, this is one mean read.

As with "Derailed", Siegel's lean prose wastes no time as it moves at the pace of the best thriller films, giving neither characters nor readers much chance to catch a breath along the way. If Paul Breidbart were to handicap "Detour", I suspect he'd calculate a 98% probability of unqualified entertainment. Bravo!

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Some thrilling parts, but far too many unlikely happenings, April 7, 2005

By 

Craig (Ohio) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Detour: A Novel (Hardcover)

Anytime you read a thriller, you need to have a willing suspension of disbelief. In his latest effort, however, Siegel provides a chain of unlikely, almost impossible, events that make it difficult to believe anything like this could happen.

The story is pretty straightforward - A couple goes to Colombia to adopt a baby, only to be taken hostage. To free his wife and new child, our hero must smuggle drugs back into the U.S. Of course, complications ensue, and he must fight to find a way to save his family and himself. To that end, it's an effective story, one that anyone with a child can relate to.

The reason I don't think this rates 4-5 stars is that, as I said earlier, the events that take place simply become too unbelievable to have any credence. It's unfortunate, because I believe this could have been a great book if Siegel had chosen to focus less on trying to shock us with plot twists, and more on the efforts of a desperate man trying to save his family. Ultimately, the book becomes predictable, and it's easy to guess the outcome.

Siegel is a fine writer, and I don't question his ability to keep the pages turning. However, I think he needs to worry less about twists (just like in Derailed) and focus on his strength, which is in building tension. He's written 3 good books to this point, but I think he can get better.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars WHAT WOULD YOU DO TO SAVE THOSE YOU LOVE?, March 11, 2005

By 

Gail Cooke (TX, USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Detour (Audio CD)

The question resonating throughout the latest spine-tingler from James Siegel is "Just how far would you go, what would you risk to save the person you love?"

Stage, film and television actor Holter Graham gives an accomplished reading to this story of a man caught in a life or death struggle.

Paul and Joanna Breidbart are a devoted married couple. Their lives are happy and complete save for the absence of a child. The waiting list to adopt a child in America is lengthy, so they decide to fly to Colombia to adopt a baby there. Their happiness is all too brief as Joanna and the baby are kidnaped; they're in the hands of drug dealers who will stop at nothing to achieve their ends.

Paul is told that in order to secure the release of his wife and baby he must smuggle cocaine worth millions into the U.S. and turn it over to a mysterious person in New Jersey within one day. If he does not do this, Joanna and the baby will both die. But, when Paul arrives at the meeting site in New Jersey the house has been destroyed.

What will he do and where will he turn in order to save his wife and child?

Siegel, the author of Derailed which Miramax has optioned for a major motion picture, delivers his story a bit like gunfire, in staccato bursts. And, it's frightening. If a fast-paced thriller laced with memorable characters is your pleasure, Detour is for you.

- Gail Cooke