Trainman

by Peter T. Deutermann and P.T. Deutermann

Book Overview

Only six major rail bridges cross the Mississippi River and connect one half of our country to the other. When one of them collapses as a freight train is crossing, the FBI sends agents Hush Hanson... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0312203756
• ISBN13: 9780312203757
• Release Date: October 1999
• Publisher: St. Martin's Press
• Length: 354 Pages
• Weight: 1.52 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 6.4" x 9.6"

Customer Reviews

Two riveting stories for the price of one

TRAIN MAN is one of those books that I couldn't put down, and which caused my wife some exasperation. ("Are you reading again?! Which do you love more - me or that book?") Uh, sorry ... what did you say, dear?This thriller by P.T. Deutermann is really two storylines in one, coming together only at the end. Each has its own protagonist and its own nutcase Bad Guy. The primary plot has the TRAIN MAN blowing up railroad river bridges in retaliation for a past personal tragedy. The Good Guy on his trail is FBI Acting Assistant Director William "Hush" Hanson, who departs the Machiavellian atmosphere of the FBI's Washington headquarters for the field to run his quarry to ground. However, even out in the sticks, Hush isn't safe from the backstabbing and internecine warfare back at the Big House as spans continue to drop into the water. And what sort of game is Senior Agent Carolyn Lang, Hanson's assigned deputy for the manhunt, playing? Is that a treacherous blade in her belt, or just a friendly nail file?The other wacko is US Army Colonel Mehle, down from the Pentagon and the National Security Council with explicit, no-nonsense orders to transport some captured Russian torpedoes with nuclear warheads from the Anniston Army Weapons Depot in Alabama to the Army's destruction facility in Tooele, Utah. The warheads need to go Right Now On The Double because they're leaking radiation, and the mode of transport is to be an Army train also taking chemical weapons to Utah for disposal. Top Brass pressure has made Mehle a bullet or two short of a full clip, so when the colonel decides to go along for the ride as the train's Full Throttle commander, Major Tom Matthews, the train's reluctant Security Officer, fears a bumpy ride and an inglorious end to his previously unblemished 20-year career. Oh, and have I mentioned that the Train Man's targets are the bridges over the lower Mississippi River, that part of the waterway smack in the path between Alabama and Utah? Can you see where this is going?Both plots are taut, suspenseful and finely paced, and the characters well drawn and believable. The identity of the TRAIN MAN comes as a surprise, though perhaps the revelation occurs too soon. Moreover, the author apparently researched America's rail system extensively, so the technical backdrop against which the action unfolds is very absorbing, especially if the reader has no prior knowledge of the subject. The novel's jacket compares it favorably to THE DAY OF THE JACKAL. I agree. This is quality reading entertainment.

Trainman

Something that puts me off about authors who use technical 'props' for their novels is innaccuracy: one slip, and it can sour the whole book. Deutermann's research into all the various elements which he ingeniously intertwines must have been exhaustive. You'd think he'd been on the railroads all his life - not to mention having been a State trooper, working for the FBI, while designing bridges in his spare time! The result is utterly convincing - leaving the reader free to be propelled along by the multi-threaded plot, which has quite a few twists. One, in particular, catches you out completely; but there are others, almost as good, which lose nothing in their effectiveness from being less unpredictable. Trainman is just a cracking good read!

Deutermann Engineers Railroad Thriller

From the first chapter, which deals with more detail than anyone should need to know about blowing up a bridge to the last climactic confrontation, this novel literally moves with the speed of a trainwreck. The identity of the terrorism as revenge culprit is well hidden and is not revealed until the final third of the book. The elements of political intrigue within the FBI, gender equity, and animosities between federal agents and local law enforcement personnel are woven together in what is a very interesting and highly entertaining story.