Man Down : A Broken Wings Thriller [Hardcover]

John E. Douglas (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1, 2002

For FBI profiler Jake Donovan, the stakes are higher than ever before: he has to get to whoever has 'disappeared' a crucial weapons researcher before nationally security is fatally breached, and he has to get to them before they get to him and those he loves most. Terrorists have blown up a Congressman's plane over Washington and the FBI Director has called on Jake to profile the possible perpetrators. But before he can get started the government mysteriously yanks him off the case. Meanwhile Jake's love life isn't going well, his former wife is no fan of his and his money is running out. However, when his financial backer, Mrs De Vries, asks the Broken Wings team to investigate the whereabouts of her missing niece, Donovan's investigation leads right to the centre of the national crisis. MAN DOWN delivers page-turning action and a stunning denouement that will attract legions of new admirers to the world of Jake Donovan and his band of profilers.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The midair explosion of a plane reportedly carrying the First Lady gets Douglas's sequel to Broken Wings off to a galloping start. Government officials hastily shoo swashbuckling hero Jake Donovan, a former FBI profiler and acclaimed nonfiction author, away from the scene of the plane crash, and before Jake can raise a fuss, he and his crack Broken Wings team (an independently funded cadre of retired elite agents) get an assignment much closer to home. Millicent DeVries, their wealthy benefactress, asks them to investigate the North Carolina murder of prominent research scientist William Rush. DeVries's married niece Janice is missing and may have been sleeping with Rush. The DeVries case looks like as if it might lead them back to the plane explosion, but the work of the team keeps being disrupted. DeVries family infighting threatens the Wings' funding. Jake's lover, Katie McManus, a crime scene investigator and Broken Wings member, inconveniently decides to cool their affair. And while Jake has heretofore had a good relationship with ex-wife Toni and their two children, Toni goes ballistic over the high-profile nature of the case. Her fears turn out to be justified: before long, their son, Eric, is kidnapped. With this sophomore mystery, Douglas drifts away from the sober, methodical, intricate presentation of forensic facts that won his first novel and earlier nonfiction well-deserved acclaim. Here, the plot is cluttered and not terribly suspenseful, with a resolution as neat as it is predictable. Broken Wings fans may feel this sequel is rushed and disappointing.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

This sequel to Broken Wings (1999) is Douglas' eleventh book. The protagonist is Jake Donovan, an FBI profiler, and the plot involves a congressman's plane that terrorists have blown up over Washington, D.C. Donovan is asked to profile the people involved; then he is pulled off the case without being told why. A rich woman asks him to investigate the disappearance of her niece; then his own son is abducted. Douglas, now retired, was the founder (in 1980) of the FBI's Investigative Support Unit, so naturally his novels are filled with FBI parlance and, of course, some violence--Donovan is shot at and his car is blown up, not surprisingly. Readers who enjoyed Broken Wings will not be disappointed with this one, nor will any reader of political thrillers. George Cohen
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: Atria; First Edition edition (November 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0671023926
• ISBN-13: 978-0671023928
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.3 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,286,137 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars exciting crime thriller, November 12, 2002

By 

Harriet Klausner - See all my reviews
(#1 Hall OF FAME REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Man Down : A Broken Wings Thriller (Hardcover)

Wealthy power broker Mrs. De Vries funds Broken Wings, a unit with broad investigative powers headed by the charismatic Jake Donovan, a brilliant profiler with a very high-resolution rate on the cases he investigates. When an airplane blows up over Washington, killing everyone aboard, FBI Director Ravan asks Jake to investigate.

When Jake arrives at the bureau he is told to go home and he realizes that his old enemy, the Attorney General has yanked him off the case. He is then asked by Mrs. De Vries to find her missing niece who was supposedly having an affair with William Rush, a scientist who had been working on a top research project, but is now dead. Jake and the team learn that Mrs. De Vries' niece has also been murdered. When the Broken Wings start putting the missing pieces together, they have their funding cut off, their investigative credentials destroyed, and the final blow comes when Jake's son Eric is kidnapped. They have to find out how all these events are linked if they hope to rescue Eric.

MAN DOWN is an exciting crime thriller that has so many unexpected twists that readers will make this a one-sitting reading experience because they want to find out who is the mastermind behind all the interconnected incidents. The hero of this novel holds up under adversity in such a stoic manner that the audience will be rooting for him to triumph over all his enemies, known and unknown, though his seeming unconcern is tested with the abduction of Eric. Fans including this reviewer will eagerly await the next Broken Wings thriller.

Harriet Klausner

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars John Douglas' writing skills are expanding., December 10, 2002

By 

"andreaskoelker910" (Kihei) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Man Down : A Broken Wings Thriller (Hardcover)

And it shows with this book. Mindhunter is first rate, and it looks as if his fictional characters will be just as mesmerizing.

5.0 out of 5 stars great book, March 27, 2010

By 

shirley fuchs - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Man Down : A Broken Wings Thriller (Hardcover)

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