David Baldacci’s Most Recent Thriller “Zero Day”

Why was a family of four murdered in brutal fashion, their bodies found lined up on the living room sofa?  Does it matter that the father was a military officer in possession of sensitive information?  Does the sleepy town in a sparsely populated area of West Virginia where coal is mined by stripping mountains play a factor in the outcome?  And will tough-minded Army Ranger, John Puller, a tall, well-proportioned, highly trained Criminal Investigation Division agent be able to figure it all out?

Baldacci’s latest book, Zero Day quickly presents these questions.  Puller, teams up with a local police Sergeant by the same of Samantha Cole, and together they begin the tedious, and as we find out, dangerous, investigation into the deaths.  But all is not what it seems as doubts about the activities of the local coal mining company and its wealthy owner begin to creep in.

Puller and Cole build a cozy working relationship that promises to blossom into something more personal, perhaps even before the case is solved.  Mix in the fact that Cole’s sister is the wife of the coal company owner, and that her brother is found lurking around Puller’s motel, and, as they say, the plot thickens.  Puller’s investigation leads back to Washington and to an ambitious General looking for her second star who stonewalls him in matters pertaining to the dead military guy.

Technical details are woven into the facts such that the reader becomes enmeshed in the complexities of the story in a way few authors can achieve.  Baldacci, with over 100 million books sold worldwide, continues to entertain us, especially if you enjoy putting the pieces of a mystery together yourself as the facts emerge.