Elevator Pitch

July 15, 2019
At the start of this gripping standalone from bestseller Barclay (A Noise Downstairs), an elevator in a Manhattan office building falls from the top floor to the bottom of the shaft, killing all four occupants. The next day, a similar fatal elevator incident occurs in a residential high-rise in another part of Manhattan. The day after that, a third falling elevator throws the city’s populace into a panic and normal activity all but ceases. Mayor Richard Headley, who’s running for reelection, must put campaigning aside to find out who’s behind the elevator sabotage and why. Meanwhile, NYPD Det. Jerry Bourque investigates the murder of a jogger, whose mutilated body was found on the High Line, the old elevated railroad that’s now a walkway. Barclay does a good job dramatizing the family dynamics of multiple characters, including the emotionally damaged Bourque, while building suspense as he slowly reveals how the jogger’s murder ties in with the elevator deaths. Readers who live on high floors will glance nervously toward the nearest stairs as they tear through this exciting thriller. Author tour. Agent: Helen Heller, Helen Heller Agency (Canada).

July 15, 2019
People in Manhattan are falling to their deaths in maliciously rigged elevators. Is it terrorism at work? And if so, are the terrorists foreign or domestic? If anyone is going to get to the bottom of things, it's hard-charging newspaper columnist Barbara Matheson. Overwhelmed New York Mayor Richard Headley, her favorite target, still has no idea what's going on after the third elevator crash or what measures to take: Dare he shut down all 70,000 elevators in the Big Apple, especially on the eve of the spectacular opening of Top of the Park, the city's second-tallest building? When a murder victim found on the popular High Line walkway with his fingertips cut off is belatedly identified as an elevator technician, the police have a possible link to the gruesome elevator deaths. But what does the subsequent bombing of a cab have to do with them? Barclay (A Noise Downstairs, 2018, etc.) is an old hand at twisty, tantalizing plots. But as promising as the premise is, it never really goes anywhere. A combination of so-so surprises, contrived turns, and gratuitous elements take the air out of the story, which also involves Barbara's contentious daughter, Arla, and the mayor's belittled son and adviser, Glover. A recurring motif is characters with restrictive physical conditions being forced to climb many flights of stairs. They include police detective Jerry Bourque, whose shrink's diagnosis that his wheezing condition is psychosomatic gets put to the test. While there's much to enjoy in Barclay's latest, the book too often sells itself and the reader short.

COPYRIGHT(2019) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

August 1, 2019
When an elevator in a Manhattan office tower plummets 40 floors, killing the four occupants, it's just the beginning of a horrible week in New York City. Over the next two days, elevator malfunctions cause more fatalities, and a taxi bombing kills three. Beleaguered Mayor Richard Headley, when asked by thorn-in-his-side columnist Barbara Matheson if it's safe to ride an elevator in the city, can only reply that he doesn't know, a response that causes chaos. Meanwhile, NYPD detectives Lisa Delgado and Jerry Bourque are working on the homicide of a man mutilated to hide his identity, who turns out to have been an expert elevator technician. Responsibility for the bombing is claimed by the increasingly violent activist group Flyover, but the person or organization causing elevators to go rogue remains a mystery until a heart-stopping climax atop a towering skyscraper. Barclay adds depth and interest with the backstories of many of his characters and the relationships between them, but this is primarily an all-stops-out thriller that will keep readers' pulses pounding, particularly those of the acrophobes among us.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)

Starred review from September 1, 2019

On Monday, an elevator erases all the floor numbers selected by its passengers, rises rapidly to the top of a 40-story New York City building, and then plummets unimpeded to the basement, killing its four passengers, one of whom is a former intern to journalist Barbara Matheson, a critic of New York mayor Richard Headley. Later the same day, an elevator technician is found dead on the High Line, murdered the previous night. On Tuesday, another elevator "accident" decapitates a famous Russian scientist, and the tabloids and TV talking heads begin to scream. By this time, NYPD detectives Jerry Bournique and Lois Delgado have learned that these fatal events are connected, and the city is in a full-scale panic. Who is responsible? Terrorists? HAL-like computers that have taken control of the many banks of elevators? Attention first turns to the Flyovers, a radical group out for revenge on coastal cities, and then upon the mayor's son. Barclay's latest (A Noise Downstairs) combines an engrossing, fast-moving, well-twisted modern-day plot with believable characters. VERDICT Fans of psychological thrillers and the author's previous books will love this. Warning: it might leave some readers a bit uncomfortable next time they enter an elevator. [See Prepub Alert, 3/11/19.]--Vicki Gregory, Sch. of Information, Univ. of South Florida, Tampa

Copyright 2019 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.