Rating: 
Summary: Enjoyable Read!
Review: I loved this book! I delayed making dinner so I could finish a few more chapters. Also, I disagree with Larry about the descriptions of the topography. I enjoyed them. I felt like I was there. In my mind's eye I could see the terrain and the conditions under which the investigators were operating. An enjoyable read!
Rating:
Summary: Aircraft disaster realism!
Review: Joe Durant, former National Transportation Safety Board investigator, is drawn back into the gruesome world of airplane disasters when a plane en route from Haily, Idaho, to Seattle crashes in the Cascade Mountains with no survivors. Aboard the flight was Joe's estranged wife, Janie. Rushing to the scene, Joe lies and begs his way back onto the NTSB investigative team. Perhaps his toughest job is telling his 15 year old daughter Sarah that her mother is dead. The NTSB's suspected reasons for the crash vary from pilot error to a bomb planted aboard the plane to a rocket launched at the plane. The team searches through the wreckage, investigates the passengers and crew, and combs the airline's company records. Then a letter is received from someone claiming to be the bomber and threatening to bring down another plane in ten days. This poignant novel has it all: compassion, critical detail, and suspense. Whether you want high techonolgy or high tension anxiety, Terminal Event is the last word in compelling realism in an engrossing story well-told. Definitely aircraft disaster realism!
Rating: 
Summary: The story is acceptable, but the typography is excruciating.
Review: Most reviews concentrate on the plot and character development. I believe this has been adequately covered by other reviewers. I want to point out that the typography in this tome is excruciating. There are no spaces after periods so that the whole thing reads like one run-on sentence. My wife gave up reading it after only a dozen pages. I finished the book, but I couldn't read it straight through the way I usually read a suspense novel, because I was fighting to find the ends of sentences all the way. I find it hard to believe that a reputable publisher would inflict this on readers.
Rating:
Summary: The story is acceptable, but the typography is excruciating.
Review: Most reviews concentrate on the plot and character development. I believe this has been adequately covered by other reviewers. I want to point out that the typography in this tome is excruciating. There are no spaces after periods so that the whole thing reads like one run-on sentence. My wife gave up reading it after only a dozen pages. I finished the book, but I couldn't read it straight through the way I usually read a suspense novel, because I was fighting to find the ends of sentences all the way. I find it hard to believe that a reputable publisher would inflict this on readers.
Rating:
Summary: A real thriller
Review: National Transportation Safety Board Site supervisor Richard Schrader worries about his former employee, legendary investigator Joe Durant. It is bad enough that Joe left the job because he could not deal with the nightmares of the human wreckage that accompanies plane crashes. However, this crash near Seattle involves his spouse, who without warning left him six months ago.Joe volunteers to help. Reluctantly Richard and the on-site team accept the assistance of one of the best crash analysts available, Joe Durant. Joe heads to the Cascade Mountains to learn what happened, not only for his own sanity, but to help their teenager move on with her life. After receiving a bomb threat note that claimed this destruction and future aerial explosions, the FBI begins a search for a potential serial bomber. TERMINAL EVENT is an extraordinary look at the work of transportation safety investigators as they struggle through the carnage of a plane crash to learn why. The story line is non-stop action that highlights the inquiries. Joe is an intriguing character whose opposite is FBI agent Linda Dillon. Their battles humanize the tale even as it breaks gender stereotypes. The end seems anti- climatic after such a stirring who-done-it. However, James Thayer demonstrates he belongs at the head of the class with this book and some of his excellent previous works such as MAN OF THE CENTURY and THE PERFECT STORM. Harriet Klausner
Rating:
Summary: A Very Intriguing Mystery re: NTSB
Review: No words are wasted. As up to date as internet gambling and today's headlines. It grips you from the first page and doesn't reveal the criminal until the very end. No regrets about this book.
Rating: 
Summary: buy it; find a deck; sit, read & enjoy
Review: summer reading never looked better. thayer's latest is a must for the deck, beach, airport or park. easy, interesting read. bit like the best of grisham (i.e. the firm) - before his all started sounding like one big variation on a theme. Thayer's consistent - his other titles are as good. Enjoy. dtk
Rating:
Summary: 2D Characters in a 3D World
Review: Terminal Event was a great technology read and provided an enormous amount of insight into the working of the National Transportation Safety Board crash investigations. From the forensic investigations of the shattered bodies to the analysis of the National Security Agency data files, the technology was spot on. Now, about the story - good grief but all the characters were two dimensional and horribly predictable. The "bomber", although not readily identified, was know as none of the suspects. The suspects - Saudi intelligence and Idaho "Off the Net" resisters - were sadly paper cutouts. Half way through the story the FBI's frustration with the non-suspects drove me - the reader - into fits of frustration. I almost put the book away but wanted to know "who done it!"
I found this book in a remaindered book strip mall book outlet. There was a good reason that it was there.
Rating:
Summary: OOH gimme more of this stuff!
Review: Thayer is a much better writer in 1st person, and did his research well regarding Airline crashes...check out Macarthur Job series Air Disasters for the real thing...
Rating:
Summary: Very disappointing
Review: The impression from the description on the back of the book is of a fast paced search for answers; bomber threatening to strike again in ten days, obsessive search for clues. This book had none of that. My biggest problem with the book was the complete lack of a sense of time. They have ten days to figure out who the bomber is yet events that take place in the book are frequently those which would take much longer (ie: the owner of the airline selling his house to make payroll? in less than a week? and his having to move out immediately?). In fact, I thought that whole plot point was forgotten about until late in the book when it's noted the deadline was the next day....
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