Wild Fire [Perfect Paperback]

Nelson DeMille (Author)

Product Details

• Perfect Paperback: 528 pages
• Publisher: Sphere; First edition (2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0316858528
• ISBN-13: 978-0316858526
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (334 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #8,322,086 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I was born in New York City in 1943. My father was a Canadian, serving at that time with the American Navy, and my mother was a Brooklyn native, trying to figure out how to grow a Victory Garden for the war effort.

My family moved to Elmont, Long Island, New York in 1947 where my father was a house builder, and my mother was a homemaker raising four boys.
I attended Elmont public schools, played football, ran track, and was on the wrestling team. I graduated Elmont Memorial High School in 1962 and spent the summer at the beach.

I attended Hofstra University, but left before graduation to join the Army in 1966. I served three years in the United States Army as an infantry lieutenant and spent one year in Vietnam as a platoon leader with the First Cavalry Division. You'll see that I used this experience in my novels "Word of Honor" and "Up Country."

After the end of my military service, I returned to Hofstra where I graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and History. I married and had two children, Lauren and Alex, and eventually divorced.

I held a series of good and bad jobs between 1970 and 1974, and in that year, for some reason I can't remember, I decided to be a writer. My first books were paperback originals, New York City police detective novels, thankfully all out of print and hard to find.

In 1978, I published my first major novel, "By the Rivers of Babylon," which was a commercial and critical success. Since then, I've written fourteen other novels and had a good time creating my characters John Corey, Ben Tyson (played by Don Johnson in the TNT movie of "Word of Honor"), foxy Emma Whitestone, Paul Brenner (played by John Travolta in the Paramount movie of "The General's Daughter"), sexy Susan Sutter, the never-say-die CIA officer Ted Nash, and my favorite villain, Asad Khalil, a misunderstood Libyan terrorist with unresolved childhood issues.

I am a member of The Authors Guild, the Mystery Writers of America (past President), American Mensa (thank God I don't have to retake that test), and I hold three honorary doctorate degrees (thank God I didn't have to study for them) from Hofstra University, Long Island University, and Dowling College.
I'm married to the love of my life, Sandy Dillingham, whom I met while I was on a publicity tour in Denver. We have a son, James, two years old, and he's keeping me young.

There's more about me on my website. Thanks for reading about me here, and I hope you enjoy my novels.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

47 of 50 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Not Wild About Wild Fire, June 21, 2007

By 

George Webster, Ph.D., (Orlando, FL USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Wild Fire (Hardcover)

Nelson DeMille's The Lion's Game is one of the best thrillers ever written, but Wild Fire lags far behind. If you are a DeMille fan, this may be exactly the thing you like, but it put me to sleep. First, there is no plot. From the book's dust jacket and early pages, you know that a wealthy oil man wants to wipe out the people of the Middle East by exploding black-market, nuclear bombs in two American cities, triggering a massive nuclear response onto the Middle East from the United States (Project Wild Fire). We know that it won't happen, so we already know that someone will stop it. Second, the book has endless conversation that drags on forever. Third, we again have Detective John Corey and FBI Agent Kate Mayfield investigating the case, but this is not the capable John Corey that we saw in The Lion's Game. This John Corey is a wisecracking buffoon, and an entire book of his one-liners becomes really tiresome. The story's end is exciting and ties up loose ends nicely. This is the first time that I did not like a DeMille book, but I suspect that his next will create the usual excitement.

32 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Truly a mixed bag... some so good, some... not so much., January 23, 2007

By 

M. Strong (Milwaukee, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Wild Fire (Hardcover)

Well, this one really has to go into the category of "what might have been." Nelson DeMille starts off so strongly with a well-researched, creative and plausible evil plot that really makes you think about where reality leaves off and fiction begins. As one review states, you get the bulk of the bad guys' plans related to you through the dialog of a long meeting; it does get a bit tedious and that's where things begin to go amiss.

As the reader, you know about 95% of the evil plot about 20% of the way into the book. For the remaining 80% of the book you follow along with DeMille's hero, John Corey, who is implausibly antagonistic to nearly everyone he meets. The character is written to be a street-hardened wiseguy who has seen too much to suffer anyone (fool or otherwise) gladly, but he just comes across as unrealistic and rather annoying. The guy isn't even all right around his wife/boss/partner who wouldn't stay with a guy like this for ten minutes.

To further the problem, you already know the evil plot, so you are forced to endure several hundred pages of the aforementioned Mr. Corey renting cars, booking hotel rooms and hassling service personnel. I'm really not kidding... that makes up the vast majority of this book. Corey also has the classic "hero who has a problem with authority" thing going on steroids. He'd be fired forty six times in real life for doing what he does in this book.

Anyhow, great idea gone to waste. Still worth reading if you like well thought out "what if" scenarios, but if bad writing and implausible characters bother you much you may want to stay away from this one.

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Underwhelming, December 6, 2007

By 

Marc Friedlander "Libre" (Howard Beach, NY United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Wild Fire (Mass Market Paperback)

I'm a huge DeMille fan - but Wild Fire fails on many levels.
Let's start with the total implausibility of the plot.
DeMille says such a plan as Wild Fire probably exists - but the book fails to make me a believer.
Let's continue with the sheer stupidity of the main characters, whom you are supposed to respect for brazenly rushing into danger, rather than following protocol, and with total disrespect for their adversaries AND their collegues.
But I can live with all that.
It's just that the book starts weakly, with no real suspense or drama, and goes downhill from there.
The last straw - for the main bad guy to explain to the people who he knows are trying to foil his plans, exactly what his plans are, and how they can indeed foil them; to lead them around at gunpoint instead of just simply blowing them away - well, I guess he never saw a James Bond movie or an episode of Get Smart.
Sheer stupidity.
Sorry Nelson - I love your other work.