THE FIRST NOVEL IN THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING JANE HAWK SERIES Meet Jane Hawk—a remarkable new heroine certain to become an icon of suspense. “This gripping thriller grabs readers from the first few pages and sweeps them along to the rousing finale.”—Booklist “I very much need to be dead.”These are the chilling words left behind by a man who had everything to live for—but took his own life. … behind by a man who had everything to live for—but took his own life. In the aftermath, his widow, Jane Hawk, does what all her grief, fear, and fury demand: find the truth, no matter what.
People of talent and accomplishment, people admired and happy and sound of mind, have been committing suicide in surprising numbers. When Jane seeks to learn why, she becomes the most-wanted fugitive in America. Her powerful enemies are protecting a secret so important—so terrifying—that they will exterminate anyone in their way.
But all their power and viciousness may not be enough to stop a woman as clever as they are cold-blooded, as relentless as they are ruthless—and who is driven by a righteous rage they can never comprehend. Because it is born of love.
Don’t miss any of Dean Koontz’s gripping Jane Hawk thrillers:
THE SILENT CORNER • THE WHISPERING ROOM • THE CROOKED STAIRCASE • THE FORBIDDEN DOOR • THE NIGHT WINDOW
Praise for The Silent Corner
“Gripping . . . The paranoia and mystery increase as the story unfolds. . . . Koontz has created [a] wonderful character in Jane Hawk. . . . Koontz rocks it again.”—Associated Press
“In this era of stingy text-message prose, Mr. Koontz is practically Shakespeare. . . . The Silent Corner brims with both action and emotion.”—Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
“The Silent Corner is vintage Dean Koontz: paranoia-fueled suspense . . . sleek and highly realized action, developed characters, and more twists and turns than any two ordinary novels combined. . . . As relevant to current events as it is audacious . . . amongst Dean Koontz’s finest contemporary work.”—Mystery Scene
“A proven specialist in action scenes, Koontz pulls off some doozies here. . . . The book is full of neat touches. . . . And the prose, as always in a Koontz novel, is first-rate. Perhaps Koontz’s leanest, meanest thriller, this initial entry in a new series introduces a smart, appealing heroine who can outthink as well as outshoot the baddest of bad dudes.”—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
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The Silent Corner is more than a little on the dark side. Jane Hawk sets out to learn why her husband, a man with everything going for him, took his own life. It soon becomes apparent that successful people all over the country are taking their lives for no obvious reason. A major force of evil is out to stop Jane, but she’s not about to have her quest for justice interfered with. The Silent Corner is the first in the Jane Hawk series, I’m starting the next one immediately.
The Silent Corner is a bit of slow starter, but the author’s talent for compelling prose draws the reader in. As the story progresses and our heroine gets deeper and deeper into a conspiracy that is both massive and terrifying, the pace picks up and makes this tale impossible to put down. One woman against the mysterious Them (with a capital T), Jane Hawk’s story moves from one terrifying clue to the next, leaving her with few options and even fewer people to trust. Being the master of paranoia that he is, Dean Koontz plays on the ‘what if’ niggling voice in us all – What if They could do that? – and builds a horrific world where things aren’t always what they seem. True-to-form, the story builds in suspense and action until the author leaves us in jaw-dropping anticipation of the next piece of the puzzle in Jane Hawk’s journey for justice.
It was the late author Bill Crider, with his ‘Outrage to Blanco’ novel that made me love revenge stories so much and they’ll always for me will be a tribute to him.
‘The Door to December’, was my introduction to Dean Koontz, although it’s been a while since I’ve read one of his books. Koontz made me think of Lisbeth Salander, with ‘The Silent Corner’ liked that he puts you in the pages, your in for a roller coaster of a read, plausible, believable, full of twist and turns, over loaded with suspense, you don’t want it to end and you’ll love Jane Hawk.
Jane Hawk’s relatable to for the reader, she’s damaged due to her husband’s suicide, yet she’s badass tough and does he ever bring her to life in this one. I like when an author takes a theme like this one, creates a realistic storyline, never misses a beat and won’t give anything away.
The Western genre made me love good verse evil themed books, most definitely will keep reading the Jane Hawk series and it’s a must read for sure.
Wow, is this a scary read! Anything that deals with mind control and human enslavement is the maximum in frightening. I’m moving on to the next book in the series because this crisis has got to be resolved!
I’m a new Dean Koontz fan (who knew?) and The Silent Corner is another enthralling story with his signature “twilight zone” embedded plot.
I’m not yet totally invested in Jane, however, though I understand her motives and backstory. Koontz seems to weave the secondary characters around her in a way that has me wondering about them more so than Jane. I’m not quite convinced a “by the book” FBI agent would go rogue so quickly. But I do know Mr. Koontz doesn’t leave threads dangling, so I know as I continue through the series, more of Jane will come through.
I enjoyed this first in the series as I’ve stated I really like the way the author brings in the impossible to the page (nano technology in this one) and the way he uses the science to configure a plot that’s almost believable! Reminds me of Stephen King’s The Institute in some ways with the basis of mind-control.
The one thing I found a little off-putting in this series so far (I’m part way through Book 2) is there is so much narrative it’s hard at times to stay focused, even with the audiobook. It’s till a great story if you don’t mind backtracking every once in awhile when the mind wanders.
I’ve already started Book 2 and intend to finish the series. This is a good one for fans of Mark Dawson’s John Milton series.
I’ve read every single Jane Hawk book by Koontz and have an ARC of The Night Window waiting for me. The series has a phenomenal heroic, complicated interesting powerful female lead character you adore. She’s a total bad*ss who just wants to avenge her husband and protect her son and, of course, save the world from techno-terrorists. Just great fun thrilling fiction.
Jane Hawk is a woman who works hard. Everyone who knows her, likes her, and everyone is upset for Jane because her husband took his own life. Odd part here is the fact that there was absolutely no reason for him to commit suicide. And he’s not the only one.
Jane knows something bad is going on here. Not paranormal, mind you. The fact is that there are others in America committing suicide. All ages, from various walks of life, and notes are being left behind that make no sense to anyone.
Why this rash of suicides? Jane receives threats to back off and stop asking questions: her child’s life is at stake. Jane decides to “hide” her son with friends and go out on this personal mission to discover what’s going on and why people are dying. What she discovers is monumental and more than frightening.
Jane rides a full-on action-packed wave as she gets chased by criminals, goes after those who are doing bad things in order to get information, teams up with a man who dresses like a homeless person, yet has his own backstory, gets chased by “armed” drones, and even finds a way into a “house of ill-repute” where the girls would make the Stepford Wives extremely proud.
If that isn’t enough of a teaser for you, I don’t know what is. This is fantastically written (as always by Mr. Koontz), and is a different tangent than normal. This is not supernatural and all the demons are extremely human. You are riveted on page one and you will not stop being riveted until you get to the end and then…you want more. And Mr. Koontz has delivered. There is a “sneak peek” for the next book in the series and it is incredible. The man who gave us unbelievable characters in the past (“Miss you, Odd Thomas”) has now given us a brand new one that will, hands-down, become another fan-favorite. 5 Stars!
A page turning thriller with great characters. This is the first book in the Jane Hawk series, and she is arguably the best character Koontz has developed to date. If you are a fan of Dean Koontz and his government conspiracy thrillers, I would highly recommend this one!
The story along with the strong female main character make this an engrossing read. Dean Koontz stories are powerful in making you think about things and this is one of those. The story deals with nanotechnology and both the good and twisted ways people may choose to use it. I think Jane Hawk is a wonderful heroine fighting for right!
As always, Dean Koontz delivers! I can’t wait to read the other books in the series as they come out. I treat Dean Koontz books as fine chocolate, savor every word and try to make them last.
I described Silent Corner as scary and realistic because the premise is a little too close to being possible in the very near future. I was actually frightened; I tried to put it down and stop reading but I needed to know the end. Which means I now need to read the sequel. I’m still fixated on the premise- can we go back to SciFy so I can relax and deny??!!
“Something is wrong with me. I need. I very much need. I very much need to be dead.”
***
“There is a spider in my brain. It talks to me.”
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Merciful heavens, but this was one hell of a ride… I love Dean Koontz – have for years. I recently rediscovered him after a somewhat lengthy (for me) break with Ashley Bell, and was reminded why he has long been one of my favorite escape authors. When I saw his latest was available on NetGalley, I jumped at the chance to read it ahead of its release date. I have really never been disappointed by him. I know a lot of people have complained that a number of his books feel too similar, that there are tropes (like the oddly-smart and self-aware dogs that recur regularly) that he over-relies on, that he’s Stephen King Light. To all those people I simply say: Hush. There are similarities between some of his books, but I never found them derivative; ditto on the Stephen King comment. And I like the dogs. So leave Mr. Koontz alone and enjoy his books for what they are – deliciously dark, suspenseful, easy to read stories about things that go bump in the night, both human and not-quite-so-human.
On to the new book.
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“Why do some people – so many – need to control others, tell them what to do, use them if they can, destroy those who won’t be used?”
…
“Why Hitler, why Stalin, why Emory Wayne Udell? I don’t know. Demonic influence or just miswired brains? In the end, does it matter which? Maybe what matters is that some of us aren’t broken by it all, that we can take it to the Emory Udells and the William Overtons and the Bertold Shennecks, take it to them and stop them before they can do everything they dream about.”
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First let me say that Jane Hawk is a FABULOUS character. She’s dark and complicated and brilliant and a perfect protagonist for a series about the incredibly (yet unfortunately all too believable) scary potential consequences of technology… The book pummels you with whip-crack twists and turns from the beginning. Jane is on the run – but from who? and why? and what on Earth is going on with the trend in utterly inexplicable suicides with bizarre notes, like those in the opening block quote? As Jane runs – isolated but not entirely alone, paranoid but not paralyzed, in the dark but not blind – the suspense thickens like winter honey, and it is every bit as sweet.
The basic premise is straightforward – an FBI agent (Jane) is completely thrown by the suicide of her husband, a Marine with everything to live for who takes his own life utterly out of the blue, leaving behind nothing but questions and an exceptionally unusual suicide note. He’s not the first, he won’t be the last. And Jane wants to know why. Her quest to figure out what happened to Nick – and why her
investigation almost immediately resulted in threats of the worst possible kind to her small son – is a quest that will take her off the grid and into dark holes of humanity (and inhumanity). Who – and what – can be trusted when everyone is hiding something?
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“Nothing I can do for you.”
“There is if you want to do it.”
“My wars were a long time ago.”
“All wars are one war. And it never ends.”
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There are so many things going on here – cutting-edge science, power-hunger, fear-mongering, threat assessment and neutralization, family loyalty (both the kind you are born to and the kind you make for yourself)… Every single one of them is handled deftly and with a cutting edge that keeps you on tenterhooks throughout the entire novel. This is what it means to be a master of suspense: the ability to deliver, page after page, a story that will NOT let you go, no matter how much you may want to run. Critics take note – Koontz is in as fine a form here as he’s ever been, and that is mighty fine indeed.
I cannot WAIT for the next Jane Hawk book. I’m hoping I’ll get lucky on NetGalley again, because the thought of waiting a year for the next installment is depressing in the extreme.
I am a fan of Koontz books, so I am used to the sometimes frantic tempo he can employ in his stories. The Silent Corner was a bit too frantic to keep my interest. The main character never became sympathetic, I knew too little about her personality, only what was driving her on her quest. The characters that were introduced to help her along were never fully realized. They were too fleetingly included, which I realize was done purposely. The main character, Jane, was supposed to be on her own, on the lam, running from bad guys. No one was safe, she didn’t want to pull anyone into her hunt for “the truth.” The downside to this was never getting attached to any of the characters, I wasn’t invested in the plot or in finding out what the “truth” was. Disappointing, I found myself skimming through chapters to get to the good parts.
The Silent Corner is a brilliant introduction to a character I can only describe as intelligent, driven, and deep. She is brought to life by Mr Koontz’s excellent prose and the paranoid perspective created by the events that happens all around her are enough to keep anyone awake late into the night.
As I write this I’m just a few chapters from the end of Book 1 and only put it away because I needed to get some sleep before heading in to work. As a writer I find Dean Koontz to be an inspiration in the field of genre writing (just like Kristine Kathryn Rusch) and will look forward to my eventual bankruptcy fueled by Amazon as it leads me to spend what little I have on otherwise delicious impulse buys.
Corporate bad guys set out to cull humanity via nano technology and one woman is out to stop them. Koontz has lost some of his mojo.
This is much more a straight-up thriller than horror– but that works just fine. Jane Hawk is an endearing but bad-*ss heroine.
In this very imaginative thriller, FBI agent Jane Hawk—the protagonist—is convinced several lucid individuals, to include her Marine Colonel husband, did not commit suicide of their own volition. But to prove her suspicions, she must go rogue, off the grid, and into The Silent Corner. Accomplishing this nearly impossible phenomenon through the use of cash, burner cellphones, library internet, and disposable vehicles, Jane intends to infiltrate the world of mad scientist Bertold Shenneck.
Although as competent and every bit as lethal as Jack Reacher, Jane finds she can’t do the job alone and enlists assistance from Dougal Traher, a mysterious ex-military loner, who provides a Terradyne Gurkha RPV—a sort of SUV and tank hybrid—as well as equally-formidable mercenary skills.
As Jane delves further and further into a dark and high-tech world, where Nano Brain Implants transform corybantic coyotes into domesticated canines, beautiful brothel escorts into submissive Stepford-like sex slaves, and powerful men into accommodating robots, the ominous tension becomes increasingly palpable.
Synchronizing to perfection a uniquely conventional and contemporary authorial style, the writing is more complex, particularly when compared to Mr. Koontz’s earlier novels. Some have labeled it Shakespearean. Others feel the excessive “throwaway lines” sabotage the novel as a whole. Does the work suffer superfluous prose? Possibly. But I must say, Mr. Koontz is among the few writers who possess the ability to captivate apathetic readers. The Silent Corner ends with a cliffhanger, and I so look forward to my next Jane Hawk encounter.
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Although I thought that this book had a slow start it was still quite good.
Jane Hawk is wonderful. Dean Koontz always writes women that are strong, intelligent and confident but also very easy to like.
When I was much younger, and read a book with some type of futuristic technology, I would ponder all of the good that could be done if we had that technology available.
Now it is frightening because I’m older and I no longer view the world through rose colored glasses. It is, sadly, more likely that technology like nanos will be used for evil because of the greed for power and wealth that has become so prevalent. This is why a book like this actually scares me more than a work of horror does.
I’m looking forward to The Whispering Room. The excerpt at the end of The Silent Corner has made me anxious for more. I hope that we see Dougal again and I truly hope that Travis remains safe.
I enjoyed “The Silent Corner.” It was well-written, fast paced and an easy read. It’s a familiar plot, similar to the Jason Bourne series or more precisely “The Manchurian Candidate.” Koontz writes with lots of short chapters that keep pulling you along. The pacing is excellent, and the book never slowed down for me. Koontz prose is straightforward, and he sprinkles in some poetic flourishes occasionally, mostly when he talks about the weather.
Jane Hawk is easy to root for. She is a skilled FBI agent with a perfect husband and son. When her husband commits suicide under suspicious circumstances, she embarks on a dangerous mission to find those responsible. She finds more than she bargains for but never falters in her resolve for revenge. It’s also of note that this is the first in a series, and carries the load of providing the background for a multi-book sequence. Jane Hawk’s work is far from done!
Sounds great – right? If you’re up for an action-packed thriller and willing to just enjoy the ride, this book is for you. But just beneath the surface are several issues that hold this book back from being great. First the characters, the good guys are great and bad guys are horrible. In fact, Jane, her deceased husband and her son, along with the allies she picks up along the way are all a little too perfect. Myself, I’d rather have characters with a few flaws, maybe even slight ambiguity between good and bad. But not this book, the baddies are horrible, just full of evil, and every death is completely justified.
As I stated, the plot is similar to “The Manchurian Candidate”, only with updated nano-tech. The action is very Jason Bourneish but substitute a Mary Sue for Jason. The paranoid theme is all too familiar these days. Shadowy pseudo-government forces have incredible abilities to track and trace their enemies, but our heroine is always one step ahead of them. In addition, karma manages to provide everything she needs along the way. Devoted allies that she barely knows, who are willing to risk life and limb for her. Money and weapons that appear like a loot drop in a video game. And bad guys that just can’t stand up to Jane’s incredible goodness.
The book reminds me of a Chicago Deep Dish pizza, tons of cheese and little nutrition. I enjoyed every bite, but afterwards I felt somewhat guilty and uncomfortable. Maybe I should have had one less piece and some more of the salad. 😉 Anyway, a well-written action-packed thriller that entertains but fails to provide any significant mental sustenance. I’m sure the inevitable movie will sell just as well as those famous Chicago pizzas. Three and a half stars, rounded down to three because of a lack of napkins.
Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for an advance copy of this book in return for an honest review.
It’s been a long time since I’ve read a Dean Koontz book. Way, way back his books were something I would look forward to, but something happened along the way and he seemed to lose his touch. Now that I think of it, the same thing happened to Stephen King’s books when he started writing the Dark Tower series. I just didn’t find them enjoyable anymore.
As for The Silent Corner, I could take it or leave it. The storyline is great, a conspiracy to weed out the population so the wealthy remain wealthy. Jane, an FBI agent, stumbles upon the plot when her husband commits suicide. She is convinced he wouldn’t have committed suicide, and her research leads her to a jump in the suicide rate and anomalies as to who is committing suicide. When she and her young son are threatened, Jane decides to go rogue to find out who is behind the plot. She discovers a plot to control the brain, making the victims subservient. The remainder of the book is mostly Jane, just driving all over the country, off the grid, trying to stay ahead of those who are hunting her. The finale is a bloody shootout, and a disappointing and abrupt ending. So you need to stayed tuned for the next in the series.
The writing style is horrible. There is so much overblown description and so much inane metaphorical description that you stop reading and think “what??” The break in concentration disrupts the flow of the book and is tiring.
I’ll take a pass on the next in the series.
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