At First Sight: A Novel of Obsession (Hardcover)

by Stephen J. Cannell (Author)
Key Phrases: power cabana, pool chair, Bob Butler, Paige Ellis, Big Mac (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Scott Brick turns Cannell's over-the-top and completely stereotypical story into a rousing and endlessly exciting listening experience. Cannell's latest tells the tale of dot-com millionaire Chick Best, a family man who becomes obsessed with a beautiful woman by the pool while on Christmas vacation. There is the spoiled housewife that spends without a care in the world, the drugged-out teenager who couldn't care less about her parents, and the sexy, mysterious stranger who becomes the object of Best's every thought. As familiar as it all sounds, Brick offers a fantastic reading in which he delves so deeply into the character of Chick Best that he almost starts to go crazy himself. The performance is not the least bit overplayed. Brick's uncanny ability to tear words from the page and breathe life into them is almost scary, and the end result is perhaps one of the best commercial thriller audio books in recent memory. A Vanguard Press hardcover (Reviews, May 26). (July)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Audio CD edition.

From Booklist
Cannell steps away from his Shane Scully series and produces what might be his best novel yet. Chick Best is a dot-com millionaire who has fallen on hard times: his money has nearly run out, his lavish lifestyle is in serious jeopardy, and his marriage is, to put it mildly, stagnant. It’s getting very hard to maintain his sense of entitlement in a world that doesn’t seem to recognize his importance. Then Chick meets Paige Ellis—well, he doesn’t so much meet her as see her emerging from a hotel pool—and promptly falls in love. So he does what any hormone-infested egotist would do: he arranges to meet the object of his affection/obsession, then murders her husband, and . . . well, let’s just say that’s merely the beginning. The novel is compulsively and stylishly written, with a protagonist who somehow manages to be both sympathetic and loathsome and a plot that is intricate and suspenseful. The novel may remind some readers of Donald Westlake’s The Hook (2000) or, perhaps, The Ax (1997), both of which tackle the theme of ordinary men who resort to murder to solve a problem. --David Pitt

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 352 pages
• Publisher: Vanguard Press (July 8, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1593154828
• ISBN-13: 978-1593154820
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.3 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (32 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #366,200 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Gross, Self-Absorbed Materialist Decides He Has to Have the "Perfect" Woman, September 19, 2008

By	Professor Donald Mitchell "Jesus Makes Me a P... (Boston) - See all my reviews (TOP 10 REVIEWER)

Chick Best isn't anyone you are going to like. That's one of the problems with this book. An even bigger problem is that what Chick does will more often disgust you than interest you. Beyond that, much of the story is predictable . . . so there isn't much to look forward to . . . except the book being over.

Even if you are a big Stephen J. Cannell fan, you may not like this book. You can definitely skip it unless you feel like you need to read every word he's ever written.

Chick Best is seeing his dot-com business go down the tubes when the family's annual trip to a tony resort on Maui makes him angrier than usual at his wife. While grouching to himself about her unreasonable demands, Chick is jolted out of his bad mood by a glimpse of a gorgeous young woman. At first, he hopes she's single. By staring and eavesdropping, Chick learns she's married. Chick can't help himself. He's got to have her. How will he do it?

From there, Chick's life comes to narrow down onto being with Paige Ellis. Nothing will get in his way.

At First Sight appears to have been intended to be a comic satire about how middle-aged men falter through trying to reverse the effects of time. I compared the book at first to some of the more extreme works of that Florida philosopher, Carl Hiaasen. But Hiaasen maintains a light touch that keeps the reader wondering what prank the author will pull next. Mr. Cannell by comparison is like the butcher who sticks his thumb on the scale to make a bigger sale; he gets your attention in an expensive way.

I find it hard to imagine a woman I know who would like this book. If seeing a man destroy anything that gets in his way appeals to you, you'll like this book a lot more than I did.

21 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars exciting thriller, July 19, 2008

By	Harriet Klausner - See all my reviews (#1 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

Fifty-five years old Chick Best has run an Internet business for the past dozen years; however recently competition from the global chains threatens to bury him. The affluent Los Angelino is married to philandering Evelyn; though she cheats on him he thanks God for that. He is concerned with his sixteen year old daughter Melissa who knows more drugs personally than any pharmaceutical company.

Chick and his two indifferent towards him women go to Hawaii on vacation. When he sees newlywed Paige Ellis emerge from the Maui hotel swimming pool, Chick finds himself in love at first sight. He insures he meets the object of his adult rated fantasy and to his chagrin, her spouse Chandler though he is cleverly nice to the man in his way. Back in the Forty-eight states, Chick is on a business trip to New York, but instead of going home he heads to Charlotte where the Ellis couple lives. There he accidentally runs over Chandler several times to eliminate the only person in the way of happily ever after with his obsession.

This is an exciting thriller with morbid dry humor as Chick allows his fixation for his love interest to get control of head as if his brain had one icon: Paige. The story line is told by the prime players, for the most part Chick. Although somewhat satirical, the reaction of Chandler's family including to a lesser degree his new wife seems too indifferent (especially when they learn how they died) even though that purposely contrasts their apathy to his killer's passion. Still Stephen J. Cannell provides readers with a fascinating "novel of obsession".

Harriet Klausner

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Reviewed for Midwest Book Review, March 2, 2009

By	Christy Tillery French "reviewer and author" (Powell, TN) - See all my reviews

Chick Best, erstwhile dot.com millionaire, was at one time on top of the world, with a luxurious home in Hollywood, cabin in Big Bear, married to a beautiful woman, with a teenage daughter. But lately things have turned sour. Chick's business is going under, his wife is having an affair, and his teenage daughter's only interest is hanging out with a criminal biker and taking drugs. The family goes on vacation to Hawaii, where Chick encounters beautiful Paige Ellis and falls in love "at first sight." Chick is despaired to learn Paige is married to Chandler, a handsome, altruistic man from a wealthy family who uses his time and money to help learning disabled kids. Chick makes an effort to get to Paige through Chandler, but it's evident Paige is very much in love with her husband. Back home, Chick can't keep his mind off Paige. When an opportunity arises to go to New York, he flies there, rents a car, and drives to her home in North Carolina, where his life begins its slow, horrific spiral downward into madness and deception.

Cannell's depiction of the shallow mindsets of the materialistic rich is revealed with humor, although at times, it seems sad and unfathomable that people actually think this way. Chick is a character readers will not like, but his inner thoughts and insights, while usually obnoxious are, nonetheless, entertaining. The story has its suspenseful moments and the reader will root for Paige, an intelligent woman who grieves the death of a man she was very much in love with while trying to deal with Chick, a middle-aged, portly man with no morals who is slowly going mad.