Night Fall

I just finished a great book! Night Fall by Nelson DeMille. I’ve read some of his stuff before, and I like most of it. I really enjoy the character Detective John Corey, who is the main character in this book.

Corey is a former NYPD homicide detective who now works with a group of FBI and CIA agents on the Anti-Terrorism Task Force or ATTF. He’s a total smart-ass and cracks me up all the time. He was also in Plum Island and The Lion’s Game.

This book opens with the memorial for the fifth anniversary of TWA flight 800 which exploded shortly after takeoff from Kennedy airport, bound for Paris. That happened, if you’ll remember back, on July 17, 1996. The explosion was witnessed by over 200 people in the Long Island/Hamptons area. And apparently, there is some dispute over the cause of the crash. Officially, the NTSB ruled that it was an electrical problem in the empty center fuel tank, which caused two explosions. The problem with that is that almost every one of the 200 witnesses say they saw what looked like a rocket or missile rising from the ground, zig-zagging as it approached the the plane, and then the explosion. The conclusion of those people is obviously that the plane was shot down, either by terrorists or by accident by the US military. You can see more information on those theories here.

So back to the book…. Corey attends the memorial on Long Island with his wife, an FBI agent who worked on the investigation right after the crash. It comes to light that a couple was on the beach that night, making a sex tape of themselves, and accidentally recorded the missile and the explosion. But since they were both married to other people, they were reluctant to come forward. And the government, eager to hush up the idea that it was not an accident, covers up the trail of this couple. Corey of course, has to go against orders and starts to investigate on his own.

Now, if you do the math, you will note that the fifth anniversary of this tragedy was in July of 2001. So as a reader, you know what the characters don’t - that there will be an undeniable terrorist attack within two months. But you don’t know what the fate of these characters will be.

It’s an action-packed book. I love that the World Trade Center is almost like a character. It was slightly eerie, I thought, but not terribly so. I read this book faster than I have read anything lately; I simply couldn’t put it down.

Note to readers - this is not the book you want to take with you to read on a plane. I was reading it on my last trip to DC. Best to avoid all mention of plane crashes while you are actually in an airplane. Just a tip.

Go read this book.

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