Rating: 
Summary: What Book Did You Read?
Review: I liked the book. I liked Mr. Baldacci's previous efforts better. Let's face it success in some ways is a curse. For a writer, there suddenly is the pressure of creating the next best seller. Granted it is the type of problem we would all like to face, but never the less, Mr. Baldacci would like to spend some of that money he has made and frankly it is hard to blame him. So he cuts a few corners and rushes a book to market to make his editors and public happy. This is not a unique story and certainly not the first time it has occured. Give him a break, the book is still better than most things on the market, a great plot, believable characters, an element of sexual tension that move things along to a conclussion that is a bit tough to believe, but works. I must say that I didn't even pick up on the dialogue problems, that many reviewers complained about. Perhaps I was just enjoying a pleasurable read!
Rating: 
Summary: Couldn't finish it, and I read 3 books a week
Review: I never got interested in the characters, they didn't seem real and the plot wasn't believable. Plus, almost everybody gets bumped off or kidnapped as soon as they are introduced. The great mystery of the "elevator distraction" was a big plot flop and I found it to be annoying. I couldn't understand why we had the reason for that fatal distraction withheld until so late in the book. The only reason the main character (an ex-secret service agent) is a lawyer is because that's what Balducci writes about. This book is a who dunnit, but I never cared who dunnit. It seems to be the result of the pressure put on successful authors to crank out more books.
Rating: 
Summary: Split Second
Review: I love all of David Baldacci's books, but this is one of my favorites. With its unique plot, typical Baldacci timing, and excellent writing, this "can't put it down" novel will keep you glued to every page. Highly recommended. Also recommended: BARK OF THE DOGWOOD by McCrae
Rating:
Summary: Pretty good read
Review: A split second is all it takes for two Secret Service agents to end up with ruined careers. The first incident involves Sean King who is distracted momentarily while protecting a presidential candidate who is then killed. The second involves another presidential candidate who is out of sight of Agent Michelle Maxwell just long enough to be kidnapped. The two former agents join forces to try to find out who is behind these incidents. The plot becomes convoluted and complex as many people seem to have a motive for masterminding the kidnapping and the murder, but nothing seems to tie the two together. A third person enters the picture as King's former lover Joan joins the investigation. Baldacci is a slick writer and he knows how to weave a web of plot and then to unravel it when the moment is right. The ending does stretch credibility, but suspending disbelief has its rewards in an entertaining read.
Rating:
Summary: Scorching plot...Average climax
Review: Like many of the reviewers here, I too have an affinity for "all books Baldacci." And, while I admit Mr. Baldacci has penned a few a novels which stand alone, I cannot bring myself to say his new offering, SPLIT SECOND, is not a thrilling, fun read. Baldacci has an impressive skill of weaving subplots in and out of his storyline controlling the reader's focus until he decides to change directions...typically in mid-thought. This skill is what makes Baldacci an up-and-coming star in the literary field. And while SPLIT SECOND won't rival TOTAL CONTROL or ABSOLUTE POWER, it is a book well worth it's price. As in several of his other books, Baldacci spins the storyline of SPLIT SECOND around the Secret Service. Baldacci links two crimes separated by eight years and brings together two publicly disgraced Secret Service agents to solve their respective mysteries. Eight years earlier, Agent Sean King was guarding a presidential candidate and took his eyes off the candidate for a split second, a split second that changed King's life forever and ended the life of the candidate. Current day...Agent Michelle Maxwell allows a presidential candidate to override the Service's chief mandate of never losing track of a subject. The result, while not as final as King's, is just as disastrous...Maxwell's subject is kidnapped. Unbeknownst to King and Maxwell, these two agents lives will become linked by two separate and ostensibly unrelated crimes all due to a "split second" hesitation. One candidate is dead, the other missing, and two careers are seemingly trashed. Though she's been put on leave and publicly vilified, Maxwell is determined to find her missing candidate. The similarity between what happened to her and King's situation eight years earlier leads her to believe there could be a link, or at least clues to assist her in solving the crime. In the meantime, King has used the proceeds of a libel lawsuit to go to law school, become a successful small-town attorney, and live a quiet, solemn life. That quiet life ends when King is reluctantly drawn into the intrigue of Maxwell's case and, his own. Joining the cast of characters and adding wrinkle to wrinkle is Joan Dillinger, King's former lover and Secret Service partner. Dillinger now runs an international investigative agency and has been privately hired to find Maxwell's missing candidate. As the plot twists through one dead end after another, the subplot involving the two women vying for King's affection thickens. This, as always, throws additional emotional baggage on King as he tries to close the unclosable case. With unexpected twists known to Baldacci readers, the storyline throws curve after curve spinning this thriller toward its climax. With SPLIT SECOND, Baldacci proves himself adroit in combining his storyline with poignant, tight subplots, developing deep, interesting characters, and providing "edge-of-your-seat" action leaving the reader thirsting for more. And, while the climax may not have been up to the quality of the storyline, this is an excellent read and is highly recommended by this reviewer.
Rating: 
Summary: In a word: AWFUL!
Review: The perfect example of a writer whose success has gone to his head and who thinks he doesn't have to keep working at his craft. This is not a thriller. It is not a whodunit. It's a mish-mosh. And in order to keep the plot moving, he switches points of view to show us the villain's reactions. But since it's a whodunit, he can't tell us who the villain is, and so calls him the "Buick guy". Please, please, don't waste your money buying this book. If you have to read it, get it from the library.
Rating:
Summary: That's it for me
Review: I've read Absolute Power, Saving Faith and now this. AP and SF each started out good then turned ludicrous. SS was just plain boring from the get. DB's stories have no depth to em.
Rating:
Summary: Sadly Disappoining Offering From a Gifted Writer
Review: I like David Baldacci. I think he's an excellent writer. He has a rare gift where his writing spans subject matters and crosses genres yet he still comes off as an expert in that particular field. He writes about lawyers, single mothers, FBI agents and many other topics with authority. Now he takes on the world of the secret service agent. Unfortunately this time he strikes out. Sean King was a secret service agent until a momentary distraction cost the life of his charge. Michele Maxwell is a current agent, but maybe not for long now that her charge was kidnapped do mostly to a single mistake. So now, of course, the two disgraced agents hook up, to the dismay of the Service, local cops, the FBI and just about everybody else. Together the try to solve the disappearance of the Presidential candidate that Michele was charge to look after while also shedding new light on the circumstances behind Sean's disgrace. Hey everyone, it's a mystery. There are so many things that I didn't like about this story. First off, the plot was so complex it was unbelievable and bordering on ridiculous. The "bad guys" motives were very weak. The characters shallow and the tensions created by bureaucratic politics predictable and so over used in today's mystery fiction. The story moved a long at a decent place to the predictable mystery style reveal followed by the bang-bang climatic finish which was anything but climatic. One of the gimmicks that is used in this story is the mystery bad guy following the good guys and commenting on their doings. Here we see an old man identified only by his make of car watching over the shoulder of our hero's. This is supposed to give us the master manipulator, on top of everything feel of our mastermind bad guys, but it comes off as cheesy. I think I may be being a bit overly harsh in my review of this book. It was not utter garbage. It's just when you expect so much out of an author based on his history, you tend to judge his failures harsher.
Rating:
Summary: A waste of time and money
Review: Having read and liked Absolute Power, Saving Faith, and other of Baldacci's books, and some of the reviews on the Internet, I was really disappointed. This one is a total waste of money and time. Baldacci lets the characters talk too much about obvious conclusions and then neglects to drop any real hints. The mystery of the villain's identity was a laughable cliché. The main shallow characters, the unconvincing dialogue, the investigators' far-fetched deductions that just happens to be true are all together insulting to the readers' intelligence. This smells of a way for the author to make a quick buck and I don't think I'll buy another Baldacci book again. It is one of the lousiest books I've read in a long time and I read two to three books a week in this very genre. It went straight into the waste paper basket after I finished it.
Rating: 
Summary: correction to an earlier review.
Review: I have to apologise/apologize to the readers of my previous review of the book (in audio) "Split Second", by David Baldacci. I misspelled Mr. Ron McLarty's name. My apologies for the error as it should be as given in the previous sentence and not McClarty, as I had it in the review. Sorry.
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