Elevator Pitch

This suspense, narrated superbly by Johnathan McClain, shows how the best audiobooks grab the listener at the outset and maintain their attention to the end. Linwood Barclay's story begins when four people board a New York office building elevator, which ascends to the top floor and then suddenly plummets. What seems to be a random accident repeats the next day and the next, creating a frenzy of fear that paralyzes the city, and intensifies with subsequent events. Detectives, assisted by a seasoned journalist, must work frenetically to find the mastermind. As the suspense builds, so do the plot twists. McClain's narration captures every moment with a deft change of pace, tone, or intensity. D.J.S. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award � AudioFile 2019, Portland, Maine

July 15, 2019
At the start of this gripping standalone from bestseller Barclay (A Noise Downstairs), an elevator in a Manhattan office building falls from the top floor to the bottom of the shaft, killing all four occupants. The next day, a similar fatal elevator incident occurs in a residential high-rise in another part of Manhattan. The day after that, a third falling elevator throws the city’s populace into a panic and normal activity all but ceases. Mayor Richard Headley, who’s running for reelection, must put campaigning aside to find out who’s behind the elevator sabotage and why. Meanwhile, NYPD Det. Jerry Bourque investigates the murder of a jogger, whose mutilated body was found on the High Line, the old elevated railroad that’s now a walkway. Barclay does a good job dramatizing the family dynamics of multiple characters, including the emotionally damaged Bourque, while building suspense as he slowly reveals how the jogger’s murder ties in with the elevator deaths. Readers who live on high floors will glance nervously toward the nearest stairs as they tear through this exciting thriller. Author tour. Agent: Helen Heller, Helen Heller Agency (Canada).