From the Emmy, PEN, Peabody, Critics’ Choice, and Golden Globe Award-winning creator of the TV show Fargo comes the thriller of the year.
On a foggy summer night, 11 people – 10 privileged, one down-on-his-luck painter – depart Martha’s Vineyard on a private jet headed for New York. Sixteen minutes later the unthinkable happens: The plane plunges into the ocean. The only survivors are Scott Burroughs – the painter – and a four-year-old boy who is now the last remaining member of an immensely wealthy and powerful media mogul’s family.
With chapters weaving between the aftermath of the crash and the backstories of the passengers and crew members – including a Wall Street titan and his wife, a Texan-born party boy just in from London, a young woman questioning her path in life, and a career pilot – the mystery surrounding the tragedy heightens. As the passengers’ intrigues unravel, odd coincidences point to a conspiracy. Was it merely by dumb chance that so many influential people perished? Or was something far more sinister at work? Events soon threaten to spiral out of control in an escalating storm of media outrage and accusations. And while Scott struggles to cope with fame that borders on notoriety, the authorities scramble to salvage the truth from the wreckage.
Amid pulse-quickening suspense, the fragile relationship between Scott and the young boy glows at the heart of this stunning novel, raising questions of fate, human nature, and the inextricable ties that bind us together.
Does Before the Fall Fall? I so wanted to write a rave review of this book.
A Tender Semi-Thriller Before the Fall is a book that really defies any attempt to categorize it. The setup is relatively simple. Scott Burroughs, a washed up painter befriends a rich trophy wife in Martha’s Vineyard and hitches a ride back to NYC on their private jet. That jet crashes and Scott is the sole adult survivor and saves a four year old boy named JJ with an amazing 15 mile swim from the crash site to the shore.
“A private plane crashes. A man and a boy survive” “When he was six, Scott Burroughs took a trip to San Francisco with his family” On this trip he witnesses a 60 year old Jack LaLanne, for the second time in his life “swim for two miles against strong ocean currents in fifty-degree water” this time around with a thousand pound boat chained to his waist. Scott was so impressed he signs up for swim classes, which 40 years later saves his life and the 4 year old son of a Television magnate, after he makes nothing short of…