CANR
WORK TITLE: INTO THE FIRE
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE: http://gregghurwitz.net/
CITY: Los Angeles
STATE:
COUNTRY: United States
NATIONALITY: American
LAST VOLUME: CANR 319
http://harvardmagazine.com/2009/07/slaying-dragons
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Born August 12, 1973, in CA; married Delinah Blake; children: two daughters.
EDUCATION:Harvard University, B.A., 1995; Oxford University, M.A., 1996.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Writer and educator. University of Southern California, Los Angeles, instructor in fiction writing. Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, guest lecturer; University of California, Los Angeles, guest lecturer. Creator of television shows for Warner Brothers Studios; consulting producer, V, ABC, 2010-11.
AVOCATIONS:Playing soccer, reading, hiking, watching films.
AWARDS:Knox Fellow; Best Read, Richard and Judy’s Spring Book Club, for You’re Next; category winner on the American Library Association’s 2017 Reading List, for Orphan X.
WRITINGS
Author of the Gregg Hurwitz blog. Writer for V (television series), ABC, 2010-11. Author of screenplays for Jerry Bruckheimer Films, Paramount Studios, Metro Goldwyn Mayer, and the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network. Contributor to MAX Sampler, Marvel Comics, 2006; writer for Wolverine, Marvel Comics, 2007, Foolkiller, Marvel Comics, 2008, Penguin: Pain and Prejudice, DC Comics, 2012, and Batman, the Dark Knight, DC Comics, 2013-14. Contributor of short stories to anthologies, including Show Business is Murder, Berkeley Crime Press, 2004; Thriller, Mira Books, 2006; Uncage Me, Bleak House Books, 2009; Hint Fiction, W. W. Norton & Company, 2010; First Thrills, Forge Books, 2010; and For the Sake of the Game: Stories Inspired by the Sherlock Holmes Canon, Pegasus Books. 2018. Contributor to periodicals, including the Wall Street Journal, the Guardian, Sexuality and Culture, and Word & Image journal. Also contributor to the Huffington Post website. Books have been published in more than thirty languages.
The “Tim Rackley” series is being adapted for television by TNT/Sony. Film rights for Orphan X were purchased by Warner Bros.
SIDELIGHTS
Gregg Hurwitz grew up in the San Francisco Bay area of California, and he wrote his first novel, The Tower, while completing his education. Since that debut thriller, Hurwitz has gone on to write more than a dozen novels and forge a career in television and writing for Marvel Comics and DC Comics.
The Tower is a psychological thriller set in the Bay area where, in an offshore maximum security prison, maniac Allander Atlasia kills everyone except for one other inmate and then escapes. The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation calls in Jade Marlow, a former agent turned bounty hunter who is known for his extraordinary tracking ability. In pursuing Allander, Marlow deals with the criminal’s demons, as well as a few of his own.
Booklist contributor David Pitt commented that Hurwitz’s characters “aren’t likable, but they are vividly rendered, the narration is sharp, and the dialogue jumps off the page.” A Kirkus Reviews contributor called The Tower a “sucker-punching, tongue-in-cheek debut psychokiller tale that spoofs, and tops, the hyperviolent Hollywood genre films that have inspired it.”
In the environmental thriller Minutes to Burn, Hurwitz places the action in a Jurassic Park-like Galapagos Islands setting. The year is 2007, the ozone layer is gone, and earthquakes are shaking the world. A deadly virus develops, a swarm of nine-foot praying mantis-like creatures threatens scientists studying the earthquakes, and the U.S. Navy SEALS are brought in to assist them. The navy crew includes the leader, Derek; a husband-and-wife team; and an immense operative named Tank. “Most enjoyable is the fiftyish knife-wielding Nam vet, Savage, who practically steals the book,” wrote a Publishers Weekly reviewer.
Hurwitz was inspired to write the novel while performing research in the Galapagos, where he encountered the strange amphibians, reptiles, and insects that are specific to the region. When he returned, he enlisted the aid of scientific experts to flesh out his story. “I was amazed how believable this story is, especially considering its somewhat outlandish plot,” commented Marc Ruby in the online Mystery Reader. Ruby added: “Hurwitz has taken the time to fill in all the interesting details of ozone depletion as well as biological and tectonic information. The science is fascinating.” A Kirkus Reviews contributor thought the book is also reminiscent of Lord of the Flies, The Dirty Dozen, “and maybe even Beowulf.” The critic noted the book’s “vivid cast” and “engrossing story. Hurwitz demonstrates once again that he’s a thriller writer to be reckoned with.”
Hurwitz dedicates Do No Harm to his physician father. The story is set in Los Angeles, California, and at the University of California, Los Angeles Medical Center, where Clyde, a man who had been included in a psychological experiment as a boy, throws corrosive lye into the face of an emergency-room nurse and then attacks a female doctor in a similar fashion. The brother of the nurse is a police officer whose full force and fury are directed at finding the perpetrator. When he is caught, Clyde is beaten by the police and scarred by the substance. Afterward, he is brought to the emergency room, where the staff, with the exception of chief of emergency services David Spier, refuses to treat him. Clyde escapes the hospital, and David risks his own life to recapture him.
Reviewing Do No Harm, Jabari Asim wrote in the Washington Post Book World that David Spier “is fully realized,” and added that “another supporting player is the most intriguing character in the book … and is one with whom Hurwitz has a great deal of fun. A shadowy operative named Ed Pinkerton—who seems to know everything and demonstrates a convenient mastery of covert surveillance, computer science, and disguise—steps in from time to time and offers David lifesaving assistance.” Booklist contributor William Beatty noted David’s application of medical ethics in his practice is just one of the threads “in a smoothly written, gripping fabric of believable incidents, ethical questions, and changing relationships.” Jo Ann Vicarel, writing in Library Journal, called Hurwitz “a brilliant storyteller.” Harriet Klausner reviewed Do No Harm on the BookBrowser Website, commenting that Hurwitz “is the heir apparent to Robin Cook if this medical thriller is an indicator of the chill level that leaves readers reconsidering any visit to an emergency room.” Klausner called the novel “a compelling read.”
Hurwitz explores themes of honor and vengeance in his fourth novel, The Kill Clause. Tim Rackley, a U.S. deputy marshal, and his wife, Dray, a Los Angeles County sheriff, receive news that their daughter has been savagely murdered on her seventh birthday. Although the perpetrator is quickly arrested, the prosecution bungles the case, and the killer is set free on a technicality. Tim is then contacted by the Commission, a vigilante group dedicated to correcting miscarriages of justice, and he is offered membership into the organization as its executioner.
The Kill Clause received mixed reviews. A Kirkus Reviews contributor observed: “Hurwitz, … wanting to write a novel of ideas that’s also a fast-paced thriller, gets hung up between the two.” Entertainment Weekly contributor Scott Brown remarked that the author “comes alive only when he’s describing men locked in mortal struggle: The violence is so detailed, so mercilessly, excruciatingly storyboarded, it’s almost erotic.” Joe Hartlaub, writing on Bookreporter.com, stated that “the ultimate aim of this fine novel is not simply to entertain but to get the reader thinking about the consequences of stepping outside the system in order to obtain a measure of justice that otherwise is denied.”
Tim Rackley enters a cult to save a film producer’s child in The Program. Having lost his job due to his involvement with the Commission, Tim accepts a proposition from Hollywood mogul Will Henning: rescue Will’s teenage daughter, Leah, from “the Program,” and Will will use his influence to help Rackley rejoin the U.S. marshal’s service. After adopting a new identity, Tim goes undercover in the Program, where he matches wits with cult founder T.D. Betters. “Grounded in character and believable detail, Hurwitz’s thriller engages on every level,” wrote a Publishers Weekly contributor. Wes Lukowsky, writing in Booklist, called the novel “a gripping read from start to finish.”
In Troubleshooter, Tim Rackley has rejoined the U.S. marshals and tangles with an outlaw motorcycle gang called the Laughing Sinners. Having learned that their president, Den Laurey, is being escorted to a federal penitentiary, members of the Sinners stage an ambush to free him, killing two marshals in the process. When Tim’s wife, Dray, now eight months pregnant, attempts to recapture Laurey, she is seriously wounded, and her husband is determined to track down the gang leader. “Hurwitz is a rock-solid writer, researcher, and plotter,” observed a critic in Publishers Weekly. A Kirkus Reviews correspondent stated: “It’s the righteously resolute Rackley you pay your money for, and he doesn’t disappoint.”
A former marine breaks out of prison and goes on a murderous rampage in Last Shot, another work featuring U.S. marshal Tim Rackley. The marshal must follow the trail of Walker Jameson, a Desert Storm veteran who masterminds his escape from Terminal Island Penitentiary and begins targeting officers of a pharmaceutical company. Hurwitz “moves easily between the gritty scenes of violence and the more subtle abuses of power in corporate boardrooms,” noted a reviewer in Publishers Weekly.
Hurwitz taps into his professional experiences as a novelist to produce The Crime Writer. Protagonist Drew Danner is a successful crime novelist whose books all bear the hallmarks of his careful research into methods of murder and techniques of forensic detection. When he wakes up in a hospital bed after brain tumor surgery, he cannot remember how or why he got there. Any relief Drew feels soon turns to horror when he finds out that he is suspected of brutally murdering his ex-fiancée, Genevieve Bertrand. Police tell him that he was found beside her body with a bloody knife in his hand. Drew has no memory of harming Genevieve and cannot think of any reason why he would kill her. He knows, however, that the pernicious effects of the tumor could have caused him to do something drastic and out of character and then block the memory from his mind.
When Drew is later acquitted of murder by reason of temporary insanity caused by the brain tumor, he investigates Genevieve’s death and whether he was really capable of viciously killing a loved one. After a second similar murder occurs, Drew’s blood is found on the scene, and he believes someone is trying to frame him for murder. Preston, Drew’s book editor, urges him to write down what is happening and approach the case analytically, as he would a crime novel. He is assisted by friends in his search, including a police forensic specialist and a juvenile delinquent. A Kirkus Reviews contributor remarked: Hurwitz’s “carefully interwoven plot lines and taut writing … make for a deeply satisfying read.” The story’s “fast pace and ingenious setup provide considerable tension,” observed a Publishers Weekly contributor. Hurwitz “has written a nice puzzler,” commented Jane Jorgenson in Library Journal.
Trust No One is another foray into the mystery-thriller genre. The novel opens with protagonist Nick Horrigan being kidnapped by the U.S. Secret Service. Secret Service agents explain that a terrorist has taken control of a nuclear power plant and will blow it up unless he can speak with Nick. A conspiracy then unfolds encompassing all known levels of the government, including the president of the United States.
Joel W. Tscherne, writing in Library Journal, remarked that the tale that unfolds “keeps the reader guessing about the motives of nearly every character.” Thomas Gaughan, a contributor to Booklist, called Trust No One a “page-to-page suspense” with “breakneck pacing” that “will please Hurwitz’s growing audience.”
Following Trust No One, Hurwitz authored They’re Watching and You’re Next. The latter novel is one of Hurwitz’s most acclaimed works to date, and it was honored as a Best Read by Richard and Judy’s Spring Book Club. You’re Next introduces Mike Wingate, a successful home contractor in Lost Hills, a Los Angeles suburb. Mike worked hard for his accomplishments, though his past is somewhat checkered. Mike’s questionable past may be haunting him as thugs William and Dodge arrive and begin threatening Mike’s family. They sneak into his house and steal his daughter’s toys and then show up at her school. William and Dodge accost Mike at an industry ceremony where he is the honoree, and his wife, Annabel, is attacked. Mike calls on an old friend, Shep, for help. They learn that William and Dodge have been sent by the Boss Man. But Mike has no idea why he is being targeted, or what the Boss Man’s motives might be.
Reviewers responded to You’re Next with high praise, noting that Mike is a compelling, realistic, and wonderfully balanced character. Reviewers additionally found the novel exciting, well-paced, and extremely suspenseful. For instance, a contributor to the online Dot Scribbles declared that the hero “has flaws and aspects of his past to be ashamed of but this just makes him more realistic and more determined to do the right thing by his family.” The contributor went on to advise: “If you are looking for a clever, fast-paced thriller then look no further than You’re Next; you won’t be able to put it down.” Proffering further praise on the Web site Jen’s Book Thoughts, a correspondent announced: “ You’re Next is Gregg Hurwitz’s finest work to date. His passion shines through in tight plotting, witty dialogue, and emotional imagery.” The reviewer added: “Hurwitz goes beyond current issues and examines the very heart of human issues.” In another laudatory assessment, a Kirkus Reviews contributor noted the “bloody but sentimental conclusion.” The reviewer also called You’re Next “a thriller that grabs readers by the seat of the pants and gives them a Wow, what next! action thrill ride.” As a Publishers Weekly reviewer pointed out, Hurwitz “masterfully provokes feelings of extreme dread in this thriller.” Seconding this opinion in Booklist, David Pitt asserted: “Hurwitz turns in another excellent performance, keeping Mike (and the reader) on edge.”
In his 2012 thriller, The Survivor, Hurwitz features an unlikely hero. Nate Overbay is thirty-six, an Iraq vet suffering from PTSD and recently diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s disease. Estranged from his wife and daughter and terminally ill, he decides to end it all, jumping from the ledge of the eleventh floor of a bank building. However, before he can jump, a team of deadly thieves attacks the bank, killing indiscriminately as they try to force their way into the vault. With nothing to lose, Nate leaves the ledge for the bank and starts to pick off the robbers one by one. The last of the team escapes, threatening revenge. This threat soon comes true when the Ukrainian hood who planned the bank heist, Pavlo, threatens to kill Nate’s wife and daughter unless he helps Pavlo get into the vault. Now it is a race against time for Nate, whose mortal time is also quite literally running out.
A Publishers Weekly contributor dubbed The Survivor a “hair-raising stand-alone” and commented that “thriller fans won’t let this one gather any dust on the nightstand.” Booklist contributor David Pitt also voiced praise for this work, noting incredulously: “Surely Hurwitz can’t keep this up forever. Lately, each new book he publishes is his best so far, and this one’s no exception.” Likewise, a Kirkus Reviews contributor felt that the author “demonstrates his mastery of the thriller genre” with The Survivor. The reviewer further observed: “Hurwitz’s writing is crisp and economical, and he steers clear of hackneyed phrases and one-dimensional characters.”
Tell No Lies focuses on another protagonist who must fight time to save himself. Daniel Brasher left money management to counsel ex-convicts, recently paroled. But when his department mailbox becomes mistakenly used by a killer to send threatening notes, Daniel is caught up in a killing spree he wants no part of. When the killer discovers the mistake, Daniel becomes the next target.
Writing in Booklist, Pitt found Tell No Lies “recommendable to [Hurwitz’s] fans, and to readers who like a good ordinary-man-in-extraordinary-circumstances thriller, but it’s not prime Hurwitz.” A Kirkus Reviews contributor had a higher assessment of the novel, calling it “another winner from a top-tier thriller writer” and further noting: “Hurwitz is no slouch at plotting …, dragging Brasher from one murder scene to another.” Similarly, a Publishers Weekly contributor termed the novel “thrill-packed.” Marcus Hammond, writing in the online Luxury Reading, also commended Tell No Lies, commenting that “Daniel Brasher is an incredibly interesting character, and Hurwitz excels at portraying him as a strong, yet regular guy with a shadowy family history.” Hammond dubbed this a “gritty, well-developed thriller.”
In his 2014 thriller, Don’t Look Back, Hurwitz features a female protagonist, Eve Hardaway, a single mother determined to break out of her comfort zone. She takes a long dreamed-of adventure vacation, rafting and hiking through the jungles and mountains of Oaxaca, in southern Mexico. She gets much more than she bargained for, however, confronted with a missing person, a killer desperate to keep his location unknown, and a storm that threatens the entire tour group.
Winnipeg Free Press Online contributor Jeff Ayers had high praise for Don’t Look Back, noting: “Hardaway’s daily life is already a struggle. Faced with more adversity, she discovers an inner strength she thought she lacked, making Don’t Look Back a terrific reading experience.” A Kirkus Reviews contributor also commended this thriller, commenting that Hurwitz “again proves himself a plot master,” adding that he “adds to his string of imaginative thrillers with an action-adventure story ready for blockbuster Hollywood.” Cynthia Price, writing in Library Journal, similarly termed the work a “taut, smart, suspense-filled ride to satisfy the most discerning of thrill seekers,” while a Publishers Weekly writer not that Hurwitz’s “characters prove their mettle through nerve-racking and exciting trials.”
Orphan X is the first book in a series featuring Evan Smoak. As an orphaned preteen, Evan is taken to be a part of the Orphan Program, a secret government project in which young orphans are trained to kill. He is known as Orphan X. Evan quits the program and begins working as a hired gun and calling himself Nowhere Man. He only takes on cases in which he is able to do good. All is well until he takes on two shadowy new clients referred to him by Morena Aguilar. In an interview with Adrian Liang for the Omnivoracious Web site, Hurwitz stated: “ Orphan X is certainly the biggest thriller I’ve written. … It all really centers on Evan Smoak. It took me a lot of years and a lot of typing to find this guy, someone I wanted to devote years and years of my life to. It’s not just because of Evan’s Black Ops training or his mental toughness … but it’s the part of Evan that is conflicted that really speaks to me.” Hurwitz told Steph Cha, a writer on the Los Angeles Times Web site: “The characters I like most tend to have a dark streak but ultimately have something about them that’s redemptive—I like characters who are so bad that they’re good.” Hurwitz went on to note: “Evan is capable of doing anything but chooses, at great personal sacrifice, to do good.” Discussing the volume’s authenticity in an interview with BookPage Online contributor Cat Acree, Hurwitz remarked: “I have a great Roladex filled with guys who have operated in all sorts of fields under all sorts of cover.” Hurwitz also said in the interview: “When I struck on the idea of the Orphan Program—a deep-black government program that pulls kids from foster homes and trains them up to be assassins—I used my contacts to make sure that the training, infrastructure and process felt genuine.”
Jeff Ayers, a reviewer on the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner Web site, commented: “The human side of Smoak makes this thriller top-notch. The reader truly cares what happens to him along with the people he cares about and those he’s trying to save.” Booklist writer Renee Young described the book as “recommended for fans of complicated heroes and action-packed suspense stories.” “Hurwitz races by minor plot holes and spins a web of relentless intrigue with bursts of tensely sketched violence,” commented a contributor to Kirkus Reviews. A reviewer writing in Publishers Weekly stated: “Hurwitz … melds nonstop action and high-tech gadgetry with an acute character study in this excellent series opener.”
The Rains, a thriller written for young adults, focuses on residents of Creek’s Cause, a small community. The town is hit by a meteor, which causes every adult to change in a terrifying way. The adults cage their own children and take them to an unknown location. Among the kids who escape are Chance and Patrick Rain, and Alex, Patrick’s girlfriend. The teens determine to stop the chaos before Patrick’s eighteenth birthday, which is quickly approaching.
“Readers with a Fifth Wave-shaped hole in their sf-loving hearts will rejoice,” asserted Krista Hutley in Booklist. A reviewer in Publishers Weekly suggested: “The fight scenes brutal and visceral, and the cliffhanger ending will have readers desperate for answers.”
In Last Chance, Hurwitz presents a sequel to The Rains. The Hosts, as the adults who have turned into monsters are called, still threaten everyone under eighteen years of age. Chance and Patrick Rain, along with Alex, are operating out of the high school. They soon discover that their is another catastrophe in the making, namely some strange, alien creatures that destroy everything they come across throughout the world. Eventually, aliens intervene to help the youngsters defeat this new enemy.
“Fresh writing and characterization sets this work apart from other zombie novels,” wrote Amy Caldera in School Library Journal. A Kirkus Reviews contributor noted: “The endless action is solid.”
Hurwitz continues the story of Evan Smoak, which began in his novel Orphan X. Noting that the series “represents the culmination of my writing career,” Hurwitz went on in an interview with Sacramento Bee Online contributor Allen Pierleoni to comment on his research for the series, noting: “I’ve shot every gun that Orphan X shoots and I trained for months in mixed martial arts fighting, mostly introducing my face to the training mat. All this serves the fiction, but it’s also a good way for me not to lose sight of the fact that life should be an adventure, and adventures require risk and danger at times.”
In the follow-up novel Nowhere Man, Evan has gone from being known as Orphan X to the “Nowhere Man” as he strikes out on his own. This time Evan is on the trail of his enemy Charles Van Sciver, an Orphan operative who is assigned to kill all former Orphans because they know too much. Also on hand is Rene Cassaroy, who wants to live forever with his rare AB blood type. To do so, he receives injections from children. “Thriller fans craving action and violence will enjoy this one,” noted a Kirkus Reviews contributor.
In the third book in the “Orphan X” series, Hellbent, Evan is joined by Joey, a sixteen-year-old girl who was once being trained as an assassin. When Evan’s mentor is assassinated, Evan knows the killer is his old nemesis, Charles Van Sciver, and sets out to track him down. “The story moves as fast as a bullet train,” wrote David Pitt in Booklist, noting how “emotionally exposed” Evan is in the story. A Kirkus Reviews contributor commented: “As well-done as the rest of the series and bloody good fun.”
Out of the Dark finds Evan is still in danger of being killed as the Orphan X program has declared that all former agents must die. Evan decides to be the aggressor and sets out to find the man who ordered the killings of so many former assassins. Evan not only wants the head man dead but also the entire organization dismantled. However, when Evan finds out that the man he is searching for has become the U.S. president, he realizes his task has just become much more difficult. The novel “is as tightly plotted, efficiently written, and, yes, as curiously plausible as its predecessors,” wrote David Pitt in Booklist. A Kirkus Reviews contributor remarked: “The plotting is clever, the action is nearly constant and usually over-the-top,” noting that even new readers of the series will “be hooked.”
Evan finds himself helping a forensic accountant named Grant Merriweather in the fifth book in the “Orphan X” series, Into The Fire. Grant had a flash drive containing evidence about a widespread money laundering scheme. Grant left the drive with his cousin, Max Merriweather, asking him to deliver it to a reporter for the Los Angeles Times if Grant ends up dead. Grant and the reporter are both killed, and Max turns to Evan for help. Evan’s protege, Josephine Moralies, or Joey, is on hand to help with the case, which takes them into the darkest parts of the city’s underworld. “By layering his nonstop action with character development, Hurwitz has created a terrific tale,” remarked a Publishers Weekly contributor. Noting that Evan is looking to retire in the novel, a Kirkus Reviews contributor commented: “Let’s hope the Nowhere Man’s phone rings again.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Booklist, March 1, 1999, David Pitt, review of The Tower, p. 1158; July, 2001, Roland Green, review of Minutes to Burn, p. 1980; August, 2002, William Beatty, review of Do No Harm, p. 1931; June 1, 2004, Wes Lukowsky, review of The Program, p. 1708; March 1, 2009, Thomas Gaughan, review of Trust No One, p. 30; May 1, 2010, David Pitt, review of They’re Watching, p. 46; May 1, 2011, David Pitt, review of You’re Next, p. 41; July 1, 2012, David Pitt, review of The Survivor, p. 33; July 1, 2013, David Pitt, review of Tell No Lies, p. 42; November 1, 2015, Michele Leber, review of Orphan X, p. 32; May 1, 2016, Renee Young, review of Orphan X, p. 53; August 1, 2016, Krista Hutley, review of The Rains, p. 76; October 1, 2017, David Pitt, review of Hellbent, p. 31; October 15, 20187, David Pitt, review of Out of the Dark, p. 26.
Entertainment Weekly, August 15, 2003, Scott Brown, review of The Kill Clause, p. 79; August 6, 2007, Adam Markovitz, review of The Crime Writer.
Kirkus Reviews, February 15, 1999, review of The Tower, p. 245; June 1, 2001, review of Minutes to Burn, p. 761; June 15, 2003, review of The Kill Clause, p. 825; July 15, 2004, review of The Program, p. 649; July 15, 2005, review of Troubleshooter, p. 756; May 15, 2007, review of The Crime Writer; June 15, 2011, review of You’re Next; August 1, 2012, review of The Survivor; July 1, 2013, review of Tell No Lies; July 15, 2014, review of Don’t Look Back; November 15, 2015, review of Orphan X; February 1, 2017, review of The Nowhere Man; Hurwitz, Gregg: August 15, 2017, review of Last Chance; November 15, 2017, review of Hellbent; November 1, 2018, review of Out of the Dark; November 15, 2019, review of Into the Fire.
Library Journal, March 15, 1999, Jo Ann Vicarel, review of The Tower, p. 109; June 15, 2002, Jo Ann Vicarel, review of Do No Harm, p. 93; September 15, 2006, Patrick Wall, review of Last Shot, p. 48; June 1, 2007, Jane Jorgenson, review of The Crime Writer, p. 114; June 15, 2009, Joel W. Tscherne, review of Trust No One, p. 60; July 1, 2014, Cynthia Price, review of Don’t Look Back, p. 75; October 15, 2014, Nancy R. Ives, audio review of Don’t Look Back, p. 54; March 15, 2016, Cliff Glaviano, review of Orphan X, p. 80.
Publishers Weekly, February 1, 1999, review of The Tower, p. 73; July 2, 2001, review of Minutes to Burn, p. 49; July 15, 2002, review of Do No Harm, p. 56; May 26, 2003, review of The Kill Clause, p. 43, and Adam Dunn, interview with Gregg Hurwitz, p. 44; July 12, 2004, review of The Program, p. 44; July 25, 2005, review of Troubleshooter, p. 45; July 24, 2006, review of Last Shot, p. 36; May 14, 2007, review of The Crime Writer, p. 32; April 20, 2009, review of Trust No One, p. 28; May 9, 2011, review of You’re Next, p. 31; June 4, 2012, review of The Survivor, p. 32; June 25, 2012, Marc Igler, “PW Talks with Gregg Hurwitz: Action, Drama, ALS,” p. 151; June 3, 2013, review of Tell No Lies, p. 37; June 16, 2014, review of Don’t Look Back, p. 58; November 9, 2015, review of Orphan X, p. 34; May 30, 2016, review of Orphan X, p. 54; August 8, 2016, review of The Rains, p. 71; October 28, 2019, review of Into the Fire, pl 79.
St. Louis Post-Dispatch, January 23, 2016 Amanda St. Amand, review of Orphan X.
School Library Journal, June, 2009, Angela Carstensen, review of Trust No One, p. 150; October, 20-17, Amty Caldera, review of Last Chance, p. 100
Variety, February 10, 2015, article about Orphan X, p. 14.
Washington Post Book World, August 13, 2002, Jabari Asim, review of Do No Harm, p. C3.
ONLINE
Aaron M. Priest Literary Agency, http://aaronpriest.com/ (December 20, 2019), author profile.
Blogcritics, http://blogcritics.org/ (February 27, 2012), Mel Odom, review of They’re Watching.
Book of Man, https://thebookofman.com/ (December 20, 2019), “Men, Myths & Killing Presidents,” author interview.
BookBrowser, http://www.bookbrowser.com/ (February 15, 1999), Harriet Klausner, review of The Tower; (June 14, 2002), Harriet Klausner, review of Do No Harm.
BookLoons, http://www.bookloons.com/ (May 25, 2008), Hilary Williamson, review of The Crime Writer.
BookPage Online, https://bookpage.com/ (July 1, 2016), Cat Acree, author interview.
Bookreporter.com, http://www.bookreporter.com/ (May 25, 2008), Joe Hartlaub, reviews of Do No Harm, The Kill Clause, The Program, Troubleshooter, and Last Shot.
Curled Up with a Good Book, http://www.curledup.com/ (May 25, 2008), Phillip Tomasso III, review of The Kill Clause.
Daily News-Miner (Fairbanks, AK), http://www.newsminer.com/ (January 23, 2016), Jeff Ayers, review of Orphan X.
Deadline, http://deadline.com/ (February 16, 2016), Ali Jaafar, article about author.
Dot Scribbles, http://dot-scribbles.blogspot.com/ (May 4, 2011), review of You’re Next.
Fantastic Fiction, https://www.fantasticfiction.com/ (September 22, 2016), author profile.
Gregg Hurwitz, http://www.gregghurwitz.net (December 20, 2019).
Inkwell Management, http://inkwellmanagement.com/ (September 22, 2016), author profile.
Jen’s Book Thoughts, http://www.jensbookthoughts.com/ (July 13, 2011), review of You’re Next.
Los Angeles Times, http://www.latimes.com/ (January 17, 2016), Steph Cha, author interview.
Luxury Reading, http://luxuryreading.com/ (October 13, 2014), review of Tell No Lies.
Mystery Ink, http://www.mysteryinkonline.com/ (May 25, 2008), David J. Montgomery, review of Last Shot.
Mystery Reader, http://www.themysteryreader.com/ (October 18, 2002), Marc Ruby, review of Minutes to Burn; (February 25, 2007), Lesley Dunlap, review of The Program.
Omnivoricious, http://www.omnivoricious.com/ (January 20, 2016), Adrian Liang, author interview.
PopMatters, http://www.popmatters.com/ (July 31, 2002), Celia S. McClinton, review of Do No Harm.
Real Book Spy, https://therealbookspy.com/ (January 28, 2018), (January 28, 2018), “Hellbent: Five Questions with Gregg Hurwitz.”
RT Book Reviews, http://www.rtbookreviews.com/ (October 23, 2014), Joyce Morgan, review of The Survivor and Tell No Lies.
Sacramento Bee, https://www.sacbee.com/ (February 7, 2019), Allen Pierleoni,”A Conversation with Gregg Hurwitz on Writing ~ and His Quirky Hero, the ‘Nowhere Man.’”
Winnipeg Free Press, http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/ (August 25, 2014), Jeff Ayers, review of Don’t Look Back.
Writer, https://www.writermag.com/ (November 1, 2017), “Gregg Hurwitz Interview: Renaissance Man.”
Short Bio:
GREGG HURWITZ is the New York Times #1 internationally bestselling author of 21 thrillers including INTO THE FIRE (January 2020). His novels have won numerous literary awards and have been published in 32 languages. Additionally, he’s written screenplays and television scripts for many of the major studios and networks, comics for DC and Marvel, and political and culture pieces for Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, and others. Gregg lives with his two Rhodesian ridgebacks in Los Angeles, where he continues to play soccer, frequently injuring himself.
Long Bio:
Gregg Hurwitz is the New York Times, #1 internationally bestselling author of 21 thrillers, including INTO THE FIRE (January 2020), and two award-winning thriller novels for teens. His novels have won numerous literary awards, graced top ten lists, and have been published in 32 languages.
Gregg has written screenplays for or sold spec scripts to many of the major studios (including THE BOOK OF HENRY), and written, developed, and produced television for various networks. He is also a New York Times bestselling comic book writer, having penned stories for Marvel (Wolverine, Punisher) and DC (Batman, Penguin). He has published numerous academic articles on Shakespeare, taught fiction writing in the USC English Department, and guest lectured for UCLA, and for Harvard in the United States and internationally. In the course of researching his thrillers, he has sneaked onto demolition ranges with Navy SEALs, swum with sharks in the Galápagos, and gone undercover into mind-control cults.
Additionally, Gregg is actively working to end polarization in politics and on college campuses. His editorial pieces have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, The Huffington Post, and others.
Hurwitz grew up in the Bay Area. While completing a BA from Harvard and a master’s from Trinity College, Oxford in Shakespearean tragedy, he wrote his first novel. He was the undergraduate scholar-athlete of the year at Harvard for his pole-vaulting exploits, and played college soccer in England, where he was a Knox fellow. He now lives in L.A. where he continues to play soccer, frequently injuring himself.
Orphan X Novels:
Into the Fire, Minotaur Books, 2020
Out of the Dark, Minotaur Books, 2019
Hellbent, Minotaur Books, 2018
The Nowhere Man, Minotaur Books, 2017
Orphan X, Minotaur Books, 2016
Other Novels:
Don't Look Back, St. Martins Press, 2014
Tell No Lies, St. Martins Press, 2013
The Survivor, St. Martins Press, 2012
You’re Next, St. Martins Press, 2011
They’re Watching, St. Martins Press, 2010 (published as Or She Dies in the UK)
Trust No One, St. Martins Press, 2009 (published as We Know in the UK)
The Crime Writer, Viking, 2007 (published as I See You in the UK)
Last Shot, William Morrow, 2006
Troubleshooter, William Morrow, 2005
The Program, William Morrow, 2004
The Kill Clause, William Morrow, 2003
Do No Harm, William Morrow, 2002
Minutes to Burn, HarperCollins, 2001
The Tower, Simon & Schuster, 1999
Young Adult Thrillers:
Last Chance, Tor, 2017
The Rains, Tor, 2016
Orphan X Stories:
"Buy a Bullet," For the Sake of the Game: Stories Inspired by the Sherlock Holmes Canon, Pegasus Books. 2018
"Buy a Bullet," Minotaur Books, 2016
Other Short Stories:
“The Thief,” First Thrills, Forge Books, 2010
“Damage,” Hint Fiction, W. W. Norton & Company, 2010
“Back and Forth,” Uncage Me, Bleak House Books, 2009
“Dirty Weather,” Thriller, Mira Books, 2006
“The Real Thing,” Meeting Across the River, BloomsburyUSA, 2005
“All Said and Done,” Show Business is Murder, Berkeley Crime Press, 2004
Articles:
"Are All Democrats Socialist? Don't Believe the Hype", Wall Street Journal, April 23, 2019
"How Thrillers Offer an Anecdote to Toxic Masculinity", The Guardian, July 20, 2018
"Shakespeare: The Original Thriller Writer", The Huffington Post, October 20, 2013
"Is Social Networking Making Us Dumber?" The Huffington Post, July 7, 2010
"What Made Von Brunn Do It?", The Huffington Post, July 19, 2009
"A Tempest, A Birth and Death: Freud, Jung, and Shakespeare’s Pericles."
Sexuality and Culture, Rutgers University, Volume 6 Number 3, Summer 2002
"The Fountain, from the which my Current Runs: A Jungian Interpretation of Othello."
The Upstart Crow, Clemson University, Volume XX, 2000
"Transforming Text: Iago’s Infection in Welles’ Othello."
Word & Image journal, UPenn, Volume 13, No 4, October-December 1997
Comics Bibliography
Batman Books:
The New 52 Zero Omnibus, DC Comics, 2012
Batman Detective #0, The Final Lesson, DC Comics, 2012
The Dark Knight #0, Chill in the Air, DC Comics 2012
The Dark Knight #10, The Hollow Man, DC Comics, 2012
The Dark Knight #11, Cycle of Violence, DC Comics, 2012
The Dark Knight #12, Mirror, Mirror, DC Comics, 2012
The Dark Knight #13, The Undead Past, DC Comics, 2012
The Dark Knight #14, The Twilight Kingdom, DC Comics, 2012
The Dark Knight #15, Cross to Bear, DC Comics, 2012
The Dark Knight Trade Edition #2: Cycle of Violence (issues #10-#15, #0), DC Comics, 2013
The Dark Knight #16, Touch of Crazy, DC Comics, 2013
The Dark Knight #17, Sweet Obsession, DC Comics, 2013
The Dark Knight #18, Devil’s Bargain, DC Comics, 2013
The Dark Knight #19, Pool of Tears, DC Comics, 2013
The Dark Knight #20, Down, Down, Down, DC Comics, 2013
The Dark Knight #21, Mad, DC Comics, 2013
The Dark Knight Trade Edition #3: Mad (issues #16-#21), DC Comics, 2014
The Dark Knight Annual #1, Once Upon a Midnight Dreary, DC Comics, 2013
The Dark Knight #22, Breaking Point, DC Comics, 2013
The Dark Knight #23, Rampant, DC Comics, 2013
The Dark Knight #24, Audience of One, DC Comics, 2013
The Dark Knight #25, Full House, DC Comics, 2013
The Dark Knight Trade Edition #4 Clay (issues #22-27), DC Comics, 2015
Batman Detective Trade Edition #2: Scare Tactics, DC Comics, 2014
Detective Comics #27 Special 75th Anniversary Edition, DC Comics, 2014
The Penguin
Penguin: Pain And Prejudice #1, Cold World, DC Comics, 2011
Penguin: Pain And Prejudice #2, Beautiful Boy, DC Comics, 2011
Penguin: Pain And Prejudice #3, Blind Love, DC Comics, 2011
Penguin: Pain And Prejudice #4, Practice Run, DC Comics, 2012
Penguin: Pain And Prejudice #5, Touch of Death, DC Comics, 2012
Penguin: Pain And Prejudice Trade Edition (issues #1-#5), DC Comics, 2012
Moon Knight
Vengeance of Moon Knight #1, Knight Falls, Marvel, 2009
Vengeance of Moon Knight #2, Past is Prologue, Marvel, 2009
Vengeance of Moon Knight #3, Full Moon, Marvel, 2010
Vengeance of Moon Knight #4, The Bushman Cometh, Marvel, 2010
Vengeance of Moon Knight #5, The Sentry’s Curse, Marvel, 2010
Vengeance of Moon Knight #6, The White Knight, Marvel, 2010
Vengeance of the Moon Knight Collection (includes issues #1-3), Marvel, 2010
Vengeance of the Moon Knight Collection: Shock and Awe (includes issues #1-6), Marvel, 2010
Vengeance of Moon Knight #7: Killed Not Dead, Marvel, 2010
Vengeance of Moon Knight #8: Sweet Slumber, Marvel, 2010
Vengeance of Moon Knight #9: Collision, Marvel, 2010
Vengeance of Moon Knight #10: Team Player, Marvel, 2010
Vengeance of Moon Knight Trade Edition #2: Killed, Not Dead (issues #7-10), Marvel, 2010
Shadowland #1: The Second Avatar, Marvel, 2010
Shadowland #2: Eclipsed, Marvel, 2010
Shadowland #3: Brothers in Arms, Marvel, 2010
Shadowland Collection (includes issues #1-3), Marvel, 2011
Punisher
Punisher #61, Quinceanera, Marvel MAX, 2008
Punisher #62, Another Day in Paradise, Marvel MAX, 2008
Punisher #63, She is Dead, Marvel MAX, 2008
Punisher #64, Satan Dust, Marvel MAX, 2008
Punisher #65, Jigsaw, Marvel MAX, 2008
Punisher Trade Edition #6 (issues #61-#66), Marvel MAX, 2011
Gateway (included in Punisher #75), Marvel MAX 2009
Punisher: Girls in White Dresses, trade, Marvel MAX 2009
Wolverine
Wolverine Annual #1, The Death Song of J. Patrick Smitty, Marvel, 2007
Wolverine, Swallowed the Spider (or Flies to a Spider), Marvel, 2008
Wolverine, Punching Bag (included in Switchback), Marvel, 2008
Wolverine, Dangerous Games (includes Death Song), hardcover and softcover trade, Marvel, 2009
Wolverine, Flies to a Spider trade collection (includes Flies to a Spider), Marvel, 2009
FoolKiller
Foolkiller #1, A Day Late and Forty Thousand Dollars Short, Marvel MAX, 2007
Foolkiller #2, Fortune’s Fool, Marvel MAX, 2008
Foolkiller #3, Fool’s Errand, Marvel MAX, 2008
Foolkiller #4, Foolproof, Marvel MAX, 2008
Foolkiller #5, Nobody’s Fool, Marvel MAX, 2008
Foolkiller Limited Series #1: Fool’s Paradise (issues #1-#5), Marvel MAX, 2008
Foolkiller #1, White Angels, Marvel MAX, 2008
Foolkiller #2, Punishment Fits the Crime, Marvel MAX, 2008
Foolkiller #3, Fool’s Gold, Marvel MAX, 2008
Foolkiller #4, Goodnight Moon, Marvel MAX, 2008
Foolkiller #5, Play the Fool, Marvel MAX 2008
Foolkiller Limited Series #2: White Angels (issues #1-#5), Marvel MAX, 2009
Others
Red Mercury (included in the The Savage Axe of Ares), Marvel, 2010
Frequently Asked Questions
Will you read my unpublished book/screenplay/poem/eulogy of Homer?
I’d love to. Really I would. But unfortunately, for legal reasons, I am unable to read unpublished manuscripts. I urge you find a critique group, a writing workshop, other aspiring authors at conferences, or kindly relatives to read your manuscript.
Will you blurb my upcoming book?
As my writing obligations continue to increase, it has become more difficult to blurb. More specifically, to get through the ever-growing mound of advanced readers copies assaulting my night stand. However, I always want to help when I can. Please look at other novels I’ve blurbed or follow me on Facebook and Twitter so you have a sense of my reading tastes before you send. If you think your work is a good fit, please email my publicist and she will let you know if I can fit it in. I will not respond to blurb requests sent to me directly. Or sent by smoke signal. Those are inconvenient, given LA smog patterns, and I always get them wrong anyways.
Will you come to my book festival/conference/circus/charity ball?
If it’s fun and it fits in my schedule and we can figure out the arrangements, probably. Please email my publicist. Detecting a pattern here yet?
Why can't I find a copy of LAST SHOT, the final Tim Rackley book?
Unfortunately, LAST SHOT is currently out of print and there isn't a set date for when it's going to be available as an e-book. It's something I have limited control over and I know how frustrating it can be. But get into a bidding war on eBay or try your local library.
Do I need to start the Orphan X series with book one or can I jump in anytime?
Jump in anytime. I make sure that each book can be read as a standalone. But if you're OCD like Evan and need the proper order, it's: ORPHAN X, THE NOWHERE MAN, HELLBENT, OUT OF THE DARK, INTO THE FIRE.
What are Orphan X's ten commandments?
Assume nothing.
How you do anything is how you do everything.
Master your surroundings.
Never make it personal.
If you don't know what to do, do nothing.
Question orders.
One mission at a time.
Never kill a kid.
Always play offense.
Never let an innocent die.
Will you contribute a short story to my anthology?
I am generally busy with competing deadlines, but you can email my publicist.
If I mail you a book, will you sign it?
Unfortunately, due to the volume of requests I receive, I’m unable to sign books sent in the mail. Plus, the postage is wrong or they got lost and next thing you know, you’re camped out on my front lawn with a picket sign. Who needs that? Check my tour schedule to see when I’m coming to a city near you. If I’m not headed your way, you can always place an order through the independent bookstores I’m visiting. If you call ahead, I can even personalize it for you. And I’ll draw a smiley face too if you want.
Will you mail me a signed photo?
No, but Justin Bieber might. Come on, people. Do you really want a picture of me? I’m not very photogenic anyway, so I promise you’re not missing much.
If I send you an email, are you really going to read it?
Absolutely. I read every email that I receive. And though I can’t always respond to every email that comes in, I always appreciate when readers take the time to write. You are the apple of my eye, the wind beneath my wings, the…oh, never mind. Just know I love hearing from you.
Despite this excess of Greggness, are there more interviews I can listen to or articles I can read?
Absolutely! Click here.
Gregg Hurwitz
(Gregg Andrew Hurwitz)
USA flag (b.1973)
Gregg Hurwitz is the internationally bestselling author of I See You, We Know, and Or She Dies. His most recent thriller, Youre Next, was a Richard and Judy selection. A graduate of Harvard and Oxford Universities, he lives with his family in California, where he writes screenplays and comics, and produces for the blockbuster television hit V.
Genres: Mystery, Thriller, Young Adult Fantasy
New Books
February 2020
(kindle)
Into the Fire
(Orphan X, book 5)
Series
Tim Rackley
1. The Kill Clause (2003)
2. The Program (2004)
3. Troubleshooter (2005)
4. Last Shot (2006)
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Orphan X
1. Orphan X (2016)
1.5. Buy a Bullet (2016)
2. The Nowhere Man (2017)
3. Hellbent (2018)
3.5. The Intern (2018)
4. Out of the Dark (2019)
5. Into the Fire (2020)
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Rains
1. The Rains (2016)
2. Last Chance (2017)
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Novels
The Tower (1999)
Minutes to Burn (2001)
Do No Harm (2002)
The Crime Writer (2007)
aka I See You
We Know (2008)
aka Trust No One
Or She Dies (2009)
aka They're Watching
You're Next (2010)
The Survivor (2011)
Tell No Lies (2013)
Don't Look Back (2014)
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Graphic Novels
Foolkiller: Fool's Paradise (2008)
Shadowland: Moon Knight (2011)
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Novellas
Dirty Weather (2006)
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Anthologies containing stories by Gregg Hurwitz
Show Business Is Murder (2004)
Thriller (2006)
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Short stories
All Said and Done (2004)
The Real Thing (2005)
Gregg Hurwitz
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Gregg Hurwitz
Born
San Francisco Bay Area
Occupation
Novelist, comic book writer
Nationality
American
Education
Harvard University
Trinity College, Oxford
Genre
Thriller
Notable works
Orphan X
Tell No Lies
Don't Look Back
Website
www.gregghurwitz.net
Gregg Andrew Hurwitz is an American novelist, script writer and producer. Most of his novels are in the thriller fiction genre.
His script writing work includes a film adaptation of his book Orphan X, a TV adaptation of Joby Warrick's Black Flags: The Rise of ISIS[1] and a screenplay for the 2017 film The Book of Henry. He also has written comic books for comic book publishers like DC Comics and Marvel Comics.
Contents
1
Personal life and education
2
Career
3
Bibliography
3.1
Novels
3.1.1
Orphan X Thrillers
3.1.1.1
Orphan X short stories
3.1.2
The Rains Brothers
3.1.3
Tim Rackley
3.1.4
Stand-Alones
3.2
Comic books
3.2.1
DC Comics
3.2.2
Marvel Comics
4
Filmography
4.1
Television
4.2
Film
5
References
6
External links
Personal life and education[edit]
Hurwitz grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area[2] and graduated from Bellarmine College Preparatory in San Jose, California. While completing a bachelor of arts degree from Harvard University (1995) and a master's from Trinity College, Oxford in Shakespearean tragedy (1996), he wrote his first novel. At Harvard, he was a student of psychologist Jordan Peterson who influenced his writing.[3] He was the undergraduate scholar-athlete of the year at Harvard for pole vaulting and played college soccer in England, where he was a Knox Fellow.[4]
Hurwitz lives in Los Angeles.[2] He is married and has two daughters.[5]
Career[edit]
Hurwitz is the author of The Tower, Minutes to Burn, Do No Harm, The Kill Clause, The Program, Troubleshooter, Last Shot, The Crime Writer, Trust No One, Don't Look Back, and Orphan X. His books have been shortlisted for best novel of the year by the International Thriller Writers, nominated for the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger, chosen as feature selections for all four major literary book clubs, honored as Book Sense Picks, and translated into 28 languages.[citation needed]
He wrote the original screenplay for the film The Book of Henry (2017), directed by Collin Trevorrow for Sidney Kimmel Entertainment, and filmed in New York.[6]
His 2016 novel Orphan X was picked up by Warner Bros. with Bradley Cooper to direct.[7] Hurwitz will write the screenplay adaptation. Hurwitz has written Wolverine, The Punisher, and Foolkiller for Marvel Comics,[8] and published numerous academic articles on Shakespeare. He has taught fiction writing in the USC English Department, and guest lectured for UCLA and Harvard. He also has written and produced season two of the TV show V.
He became the writer of Batman: The Dark Knight for DC Comics in 2012.[9][10]
Bibliography[edit]
Novels[edit]
Orphan X Thrillers[edit]
Orphan X, January 2016
The Nowhere Man, January 2017
Hellbent, January 2018
Out of the Dark, January 2019
Into the Fire, January 2020
Orphan X short stories[edit]
"Buy a Bullet", October 2016
"The Intern", December 2018
The Rains Brothers[edit]
The Rains, October 2016
Last Chance, October 2017
Tim Rackley[edit]
The Kill Clause, August 2004
The Program, August 2005
Troubleshooter, July 2006
Last Shot, July 2007
Stand-Alones[edit]
The Tower, April 1999
Minutes to Burn, July 2001
Do No Harm, July 2002
The Crime Writer (also known as I See You), June 2008
Trust No One (UK title as We Know), June 2010
They're Watching (UK title as Or She Dies), April 2011
You're Next, January 2011
The Survivor, July 2012
Tell No Lies, August 2013
Don't Look Back, August 2014
Comic books[edit]
DC Comics[edit]
Batman: The Dark Knight #10–29, 0, Annual #1, 2012–2014
Detective Comics #0, 27, 2012–2014
Penguin: Pain and Prejudice #1–5, 2011–2012
Marvel Comics[edit]
Foolkiller vol. 2 #1–5, 2007
Foolkiller: White Angels #1–5, 2008–2009
The New Avengers #55, 2009
Punisher #61–95, 75, 2008–2009
The Savage Axe of Ares #1, 2011
The Vengeance of Moon Knight #1–10, 2009–2010
Shadowland: Moon Knight #1–3, 2010
Wolverine Annual #1, 2007
Wolverine: Flies to a Spider #1, 2009
Wolverine: Switchback #1, 2009
X-Men Forever #4 , 2009
Filmography[edit]
Television[edit]
V (7 episodes, 2010–11)
Queen of the South, Season 1 Episode 8: Billete de Magia)
Film[edit]
The Book of Henry
Sweet Girl
GREGG HURWITZ is the New York Times #1 internationally bestselling author of twenty thrillers including OUT OF THE DARK (January 2019). His novels have won numerous literary awards and have been published in thirty languages. Additionally, he's written screenplays and television scripts for many of the major studios and networks. Gregg lives with his two Rhodesian ridgebacks in Los Angeles, where he continues to play soccer, frequently injuring himself.
New York Times bestseller Gregg Hurwitz’s Orphan X, the first book in the Evan Smoak series, became an instant international bestseller upon publication in 2016 and was one of the most acclaimed thrillers of the year. It was named a Best Book of the Year by Amazon and Audible, a Best Book of the Year So Far by iBooks, an Indie Next Great Read by the American Booksellers Association, and was a category winner on the American Library Association’s 2017 Reading List. It has been published in 24 languages. The successive novels in the series, The Nowhere Man and Hellbent, hit #1 spots on UK and New Zealand bestseller lists and also landed on the Publishers Weekly, USA Today, iTunes, and Audible bestseller lists in the US. In January 2019, Minotaur published the fourth book in the series, Out of the Dark, which became an instant bestseller on the New York Times hardcover list and combined print and e-book list. In their review, The Associated Press declared, “It’s only the end of January, but this novel will be remembered as one of the best thrillers of the year.”
Tor Teen published Gregg’s first novel for young adults: The Rains, which has been hailed by Kirkus as a “fast-paced, adrenaline-pumping story” that “science-fiction fans won’t want to miss” and Booklist declares that readers “will rejoice” over this “suspenseful series starter” that is also a “tense, disturbing tale” (Publishers Weekly). It won a 2018 Thriller Award by International Thriller Writers for Best Young Adult Novel. Last Chance, the second novel in the series, has been published by Tor Teen.
Gregg’s previous novels have been shortlisted for numerous literary awards, including two Best Novel nominations from the International Thriller Writers Association for The Survivor and The Crime Writer. The Crime Writer was also a finalist for the British Crime Writers Association’s Ian Fleming Steel Dagger Award for Best Novel. (Published in the UK under the title I See You).
Agent: Lisa Erbach Vance
Website: gregghurwitz.net
Twitter: @GreggHurwitz
Facebook: Gregg Hurwitz's Facebook Page
A conversation with Gregg Hurwitz on writing ~ and his quirky hero, the ‘Nowhere Man’
By Allen Pierleoni
February 07, 2019 03:00 AM
Best-selling thriller novelist Gregg Hurwitz knew since childhood he wanted to be a writer. Kaye Publicity
Best-selling thriller novelist Gregg Hurwitz knew since childhood he wanted to be a writer. To the point that he specifically targeted the two specialties he believes are essential for a career in fiction - English and psychology – and earned degrees from Harvard and Oxford to master them.
His plan worked. Hurwitz, 46, has written 20 thrillers published in 30 languages, two of which were shortlisted by the International Thriller Writers for best novel of the year (“The Crime Writer,” 2007, and “The Survivor,” 2011).
“I write the kinds of stories I love to read,” he said. “I’m really fortunate never to have had a real job.”
Hurwitz is also a screenwriter for movies (“The Book of Henry,” from his novel, and “Careful What You Wish For”) and TV (the ABC sci-fi series “V” and the upcoming Bradley Cooper project “Black Flags” for HBO). He’s also written the text for graphic novels published by DC Comics and Marvel Comics, including “Batman,” “Foolkiller,” “X- Men” and “Wolverine.”
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His biggest splash – a breaching whale, really – is the critically acclaimed four-title “Orphan X” series. The latest is “Out of the Dark” (Minotaur, $28, 400 pages).
“‘Orphan X’ represents the culmination of my writing career,” Hurwitz said. The concept is unique in the overpopulated thriller genre, Jack Reacher and Jason Bourne notwithstanding.
Tech-savvy Evan Smoak was taken from a foster home at age 12 and trained all his life as an elite assassin in the black-ops Orphan Program, deeply buried in the Department of Defense. Its agents are sent to international locations to eliminate targets, never knowing why and always under the DOJ’s policy of plausible deniability.
As an adult who has grown weary of the life – mostly because his moral compass has not been destroyed - he left the program and vanished. He took with him a lethal skill set and a fortune in hidden bank accounts, ending up in a luxury penthouse apartment in L.A.
To find some redemption, he assumed the identity of the mysterious vigilante known on the streets as the Nowhere Man, whose self-imposed mission is to help the truly desperate and deserving who have nowhere else to turn. Problem is, the former head of the Orphan Program – who has since risen in national politics – is intent on erasing any evidence the organization ever existed. Meaning all the agents must vanish.
In a recent bidding war, the “Orphan X” series was acquired by a production company for a TV series, for which Hurwitz is adapting his books. Hurwitz grew up in Saratoga, near San Jose, and now lives in Los Angeles with his wife and two daughters.
“My favorite activity, beyond drinking bourbon, is eating,” he said. “We have so many ethnicities thrown together here, which means countless amazing places to eat.”
Visit the author at www.gregghurwitz.net.
Q: Is writing graphic novels like writing screenplays, given both depend so much on their visual elements?
A: Yes, except you have much less room in a comic. With film and TV, you can only show visuals, you can’t go inside a character’s head unless you rely on the crutch of voiceover. But with a comic, you’re holding the camera and you can only take four to five snapshots per page. You have to decide which frozen images best chart the course of the scene you’re trying to convey.
Q: Your work for Marvel and DC can be perceived as counterintuitive, given your formal education, including a master’s degree in Shakespearean tragedy from Oxford.
A: People forget that Shakespeare’s desire wasn’t to create enduring literary value, but to sell out the Globe Theatre. His jokes vacillated between glancing references to the classics for royalty sitting up in the boxes, to (coarse) jokes to amuse the groundlings. He was trying to speak to every cross-section of Elizabethan society at once in the most commercially viable way. We attempt to do that today in comics and thrillers and films.
Q: What mindset is required to move from working on a novel - alone in your office - to the collaborations that movie and TV projects require?
A: There’s a certain letting go. In one regard, a screenplay is an invitation to collaborate. It’s a roadmap to an aesthetic destination, and you have to choose your partners wisely for the trip or you’ll wind up in a ditch. You want to give the director, producers and actors room to bring their own energy and creativity to bear, and trust they will elevate the project.
Q: For research, you consult with a range of experts. Who are they?
A: Professors and porn stars, Army Rangers and CIA operatives, emergency room docs and Silicon Valley chief technology officers. I have to be willing to go anywhere and speak to anyone in order to give the reader a front-row seat to the action. The subject-matter experts I want to talk to are the ones who don’t want to talk. The public information officer of an agency is never gonna give me the uncensored details I need to make a book ring with verisimilitude. I have to get to the men and women who actually are undertaking the operations and build trust so I can hear how they talk and think and see the world.
Q: Also for research, you’ve said you’ve flown in stunt planes, swum with sharks, sneaked onto demolition ranges with Navy SEALs and blown up cars. To get into an Evan Smoak frame of mind, do you go to the gun range and the dojo?
A: I do indeed. I’ve shot every gun that Orphan X shoots and I trained for months in mixed martial arts fighting, mostly introducing my face to the training mat. All this serves the fiction, but it’s also a good way for me not to lose sight of the fact that life should be an adventure, and adventures require risk and danger at times.
Q: You’re adapting the four “Orphan X” thrillers into a TV series. What are the challenges?
A: There’s a lot of adjusting to move from one form to another. A TV pilot presents some unique challenges in that you’re setting out to write a story that can stand on its own, but also set the template for a season and for future seasons. It’s tricky business and lots of fun.
Q: There are similarities between Evan Smoak and archetypal thriller characters, yet he departs from that mold. For one thing, you show readers his “real world” – one that includes his neighbor Mia, a single mom with whom he has a relationship.
A: The one thing we never get to see is James Bond go home. Or Jason Bourne have to make awkward small talk with the pushy, elderly lady who lives upstairs from him. I wanted to take an archetypal character and seat him inside the same world where you and I live.
Q: Beyond the action, readers really enjoy Evan’s quirks, such as his appreciation of artisanal vodka, his herb wall and the “pet” plant he talks to.
A: Stories live and breathe by the particulars. As much as thrillers lay down on an archetypal structure, the specifics are what we always attach to. How many people remember the specifics of a James Bond action scene versus remembering how he takes his martini?
Q: You said in an interview, “Evan’s struggle is between intimacy and perfection. Even in the face of being a perfectionist, he strives for human contact.”
A: I’m a perfectionist, and I’ve clung to certain ideals with a compulsiveness that hasn’t always served me. But it’s been very effective in helping me reach my goals. But some of the higher goals don’t exist along that same trajectory. Like having someone in your life - a spouse, a child - with all the vulnerability and fear and love that go with it. So there’s a tension between the two ideals, and it’s a tension Evan is trapped between. Does he stay the rigid assassin who lives his life by the 10 Operational Commandments? Or does he learn to break up his constructed worldview and enter the scarier fray of human interaction?
Q: Evan Smoak is quite definite about his personal preferences. What about yours?
A: Chandler over Hammett. Bourbon over scotch. Beatles over Stones. Ridgebacks over Labradors. Giants over Dodgers. Red Sox over Yankees. And always, always use the Oxford comma.
Book signing
Who: New York Times best-selling author Gregg Hurwitz will give a reading, answer audience questions and autograph books.
Where: Barnes & Noble, 1725 Arden Way, Sacramento
When: 7 p.m. Friday, Feb. 8
Cost: Free. Note: Barnes & Noble will give a 20 percent discount on “Out of the Dark” at this event. Information: (916) 565-0644
Read more here: https://www.sacbee.com/entertainment/books/article225513135.html#storylink=cpy
Men, Myths & Killing Presidents
Culture
Author Gregg Hurwitz on his latest Orphan X novel about an attempt to assassinate the President, his astonishing level of research, and why men need to confront their fears.
Gregg Hurwitz is probably best known now for Orphan X, his best-selling thriller about Evan Smoak, an orphan trained to be an assassin by a secret government agency. However, with 20 novels under his belt, as well as screenwriting credits and work on comics like Batman and Wolverine, he is the consummate story-telling pro. His latest Orphan book, Out of the Dark, is now available, perhaps his most ambitious yet as Smoak attempts to take down the President of the United States.
We managed to get some time with Gregg when he was in London recently, to find out more about his famously in-depth research – swimming with sharks, shooting with Navy SEALs, plus some more prosaic office-based stuff we’re sure – the psychological theories behind his writing, and the importance of adventure narratives, both external and internal.
On Out of the Dark
The Day of the Jackal is a seminal thriller and I always wanted to write a contemporary homage to it. It took me 20 novels to make me feel like I had the right skillset to tackle a novel that big. It’s essentially the biggest thriller I could think of. And even more complicated because we’re rooting for Orphan X to assassinate the highly corrupt president.
I really had to build to it. I spent the first two months doing tons of research about all the security procedures. I got the blueprints to Cadillac One, or Beast One, that’s the Presidential limousine, where the doors are as heavy as a Boeing 747. I got info on the entrances to the White House, what the procedures are when the President travels. The first two months were building this wall of possibility in front of me and then I was staring at it like a figure from Game Of Thrones with this giant wall looming over me. I had to figure out how to scale this in a way that felt plausible.
The research is to have the ring of verisimilitude. I’ve done all sorts of stuff, I’ve gone undercover with mind-control cults, I’ve been on demolition ranges with SEALs and blown up cars, gone swimming with sharks in Galapagos. Why do I do it? Firstly, because it’s fun. It keeps me acquainted with the fact that life’s an adventure. But the other thing is it lets me pick the right telling details so that the reader really feels the action. If I don’t do it myself I would be combining all of the usual stuff people have already seen in pop culture in books and movies and TV. And It would just be a shadow of stuff that’s already been recycled.
It’s like I’m trying to carry the reader over the suspension of disbelief. And so the research helps me do that.
What’s crazy is that this is one of the most complicated books that I’ve ever written. Obviously there’s the big A thriller, which is Orphan X trying to take down the most securely guarded human being on the planet. But as he’s pursuing the president I have Orphan A pursuing him. Then there’s this dance going on between him and Candy McClure, who’s Orphan B, and all these other sub-plots, but what’s so weird is this book wrote itself relatively easily. Only in 3 of the 20 books I’ve written have I had a handle on all the way through, and this happened to be one of them. It’s far and away the most intricate, complicated book I’ve ever done and I never lost the thread, which was a total delight. With every other book, in the middle somewhere I get all muddled and turned around and miserable.
On his research contacts
I have a Rolodex at this point of amazing contacts, from porn stars to professors to army rangers to demolition reachers. It’s sort of a mafia process of introduction, so if I need someone in the Secret Service I’ll reach out to a SEAL buddy who once did a joint op with someone in the CIA, who was friends with someone in the secret service.
You always want the guys who don’t want to talk, you don’t want the public information officer, you want the quieter people who don’t tell a lot of stories. And then it’s really about establishing trust with them. So they can go on and off the record, they can give you some information but also come back and say, ‘look I need you to remove this.’ Or ‘we’re going to change 3 things about how we’re going to make that explosive device because we don’t want to make this a ‘how to’ guide.’ So there’s a lot of trust and relationship building.
It’s not about Trump. I put this story in motion well before Trump entered the race. All previous Orphan X books have been building to pushing him on the doorstep of chapter one here. President Bennett, my president, is very different to Trump in a lot of ways and I’m glad for that. He’s very controlled, very focused, very disciplined. I don’t want to be writing something that’s ripped from the headlines because that ages really quickly. I wanted to write a timeless book.
But I’ll tell you this, I’m screwed if anybody checks my search history. It’s all like ‘hotel balcony with best view of the White House.’ If I didn’t have a body of work behind me, I’d surely be in trouble.
On exploring the hero myth in thrillers
I’m a Jungian by training. Carl Jung is sort of my spirit animal. So I believe the hero myth is a necessity for the development of humanity. If you find a tribe in the Amazon that’s been cut off from all human contact, you know they’re going to have eyelids, you know they’re going to have opposable thumbs, and you know they’re going to have a hero myth.
I think the hero myth is a guide and a template that has been evolutionarily selected to show us how we deal with the unknown, both internally and externally. To enact it positively you have to voluntarily confront that which you fear. If you hole up and hide in your castle, the dragon comes and gets you. You have to be voluntarily willing to face that which is scary. And if you slay the dragon, the dragon is always guarding a pot of gold, which stands for self-knowledge. So if you triumph over the dragon, you win back some information about yourself.
I think that’s a template that pushes us a) towards the fact that life is an adventure, do not forget that, and b), to be courageous and c) to be honest, because the unknown internally, represents all the things that we try to hide from ourselves. We put up defences to hide the truth from ourselves, even if the truth is just our own fragility or insecurity or vulnerability. It’s only by confronting all these things that we can integrate them and move forward.
Evan Smoak was raised with the ten commandments from Jack Johns, the ten operational commandments. Never make it personal. How you do anything is how you do everything. But I wanted to counteract that with someone who has been raised properly and not insanely, and that’s Peter the young boy downstairs. He’s raised by a set of rules I took from Jordan Peterson. Jordan Peterson was my thesis advisor when I was an undergrad, and at the time I was helping him edit this book that he wrote. This fairly unknown psychology professor. I thought I’d use some of these rules that he’s writing, this should be uncontroversial, no one knows this guy! I was using these rules as a template towards honesty and orientation of the world for Evan to see a male boy who’s raised properly, unlike the way that he’s been raised.
On the meaning of his books to him
I never realise the meaning the books have for me, psychologically or emotionally until I’m done writing them and then I look back. I started to write these Orphan X books right around when I was 40 years old, and I thought initially they were about the tension between perfection and intimacy. I’d just come off writing Batman for a couple of years for DC, and I’m always interested in Batman, he’s my favourite superhero because he doesn’t fly he doesn’t have a magic ring, he just represents the height of discipline. And the reason why he can do that is because there’s no-one else in his life. His parents are dead, he’s a playboy, so women are in and out of his life all the time. There’s Robin but Robin always dies. He’s alone, and the aloneness is why he’s able to maintain a schedule.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIg6WbI9_tQ
So I thought I was writing the Orphan X books out of trying to integrate how to hold the standards of perfection while having a wife and kids. And also not wanting to be an asshole. Not wanting to give them short shrift, wanting to be honest and available but also not lose an edge and a drive towards perfection, and a sense of adventure that may be masculine.
I kind of thought that’s what the books were about, but when I looked back I realised that I started writing them during a time when I was really transitioning. Transition points occur throughout your life, whether it’s adolescence or retirement, and certainly turning 40 was a big one for me. I started to look around and see that a lot of the traits and habits that have carried me forward, even successfully, to the midpoint of my life, weren’t necessarily the ones that will bring me the most happiness and wholeness for the back half of my life.
I think we all realise that, but it’s hard to let go of the traits that have been useful. If there’s certain characteristics that we know are weaknesses, we know we have got to work on them and let go of them, but some of these things are strengths that just no longer serve us as well.
And as I was looking at all this – I just realised this a month ago, its so embarrassing – I looked back at these characters that I’ve been writing for five years and sure enough, when we first meet Orphan X in the first book he’s just at a certain point, he’s left the program, he’s reestablished himself under his own moral compass and he’s just trying to find his way to a different definition of humanity. And the first book involves him breaking every one of the commandments that are these rules that he’s been following his whole life. So he’s really enacting the same thing that I was wrestling with as a man.
On the importance of danger to explore yourself
A lot of my friends tend to have in their pasts something that’s dangerous. Like I was a pole vaulter, one of my good friends who’s now the CEO of Intel, an amazing man, he designed the fastest computer chip 3 times over, and he’s a stunt pilot. I have a lot of friends who are former Navy SEALs. I’ve noticed I’m drawn to a lot of people who worked in something that involves danger. Even comedy, it doesn’t have to be physical danger.
A lot of times for young men it’s like we’re honing this edge, by going up against life in a way that’s sharpening and sharpening and sharpening us. And if we hone that properly and orient it correctly, at a certain point in life you use that sharp edge to tear through yourself, and investigate yourself in the way that you want to be better. It’s true for women too, I don’t want to imply it’s only for men. Some of that hardening and edge-making that we do in the front part of our life, through danger, through confronting the unknown, through adventure, becomes a useful trip to apply to an internal state. To what you don’t know but what you’re willing to go into voluntarily, and confront, psychologically.
Jumping out a plane is not entirely dissimilar from having a conversation with someone who is completely opposed to your viewpoint, let’s say politically. If you don’t feel like you have to armour yourself with your perspective or corrections or your worldview, you can actually just safely listen and try to figure out what it is they’re saying. And figure out if you can engage with a set of ideas that may be uncomfortable. There’s something in that that’s not totally dissimilar to standing on the edge of the pole vaulting runway being terrified because you have no idea if the pole’s going to break and you’ll smack your head open. There’s an aspect of that when you start looking at yourself, of looking at your own flaws when you’re called to. Going into a conversation where your spouse tells you that you have to look at something about yourself that you don’t want to look at that’s a sign of vulnerability or a fear or something you have.
On the debate around masculinity
Yeah we’re grappling with it right now. There’s a line Jordan has said which I’ve stolen: if you get scared of strong men you should be terrified of what weak men are capable of. And I do think we don’t want to take the edge off men and boys too much. Part of the job is they have to figure out their way through. We have to be tolerant for everybody to be developing and to have a certain amount of freedom and a certain amount of rough edges that the world is honing, and knocking off them. We have to be willing to have boys commit to endeavours that are risky. Obviously I’m not implying this is to encourage misogyny, it’s ridiculous that have to make these designations now, but I’m not talking about stuff that is obviously crassly offensive and should be reigned in, responsibly. But we don’t want to create kids who are really, really timid in any sense. So I’m very much for the rigours of argument and confrontation and risk taking. I have two daughters and I think its good for them to go out and be active and get injured. You’ve heard the phrase ‘helicopter parents’, but my wife who’s a psychologist has heard the phrase ‘lawnmower parents’, about parents who go ahead of their kids to mow down all the obstacles so they don’t even have to have the helicopter. My girls are really active, and my youngest just broke her wrist playing something. We don’t have an approach to protect the kids from all injuries. We have an approach that the kids should be out in the world and active and engaged and having fun, and sometimes when you do that you’ll get injured or make mistakes, but that’s all part of what life is.
On fiction as a relief from puritanical social media
I think we have a lot of people self-censoring because of what the mob will think. I think people are much more reasonable and willing to countenance opposing views than they seem on social media, and I think there’s something like pluralistic ignorance going on where everyone is miserable but can’t talk to one another. The voices on social media creates a chihuahua effect: there’s a small minority of voices but they’re really really loud. And so everyone gets washed up in it and self-censors or gets worried. There’s so much moral outrage and the dopamine hits from moral outrage are so intense, and that’s when you also have people curating their space on social media, that they only get people who think like them, and the more feedback they get, the more extreme they can be.
I do think there’s an important role for fiction not only to explore ideas that are different or complicated or grey, but also to be the kind of stories – especially in genre fiction which again have that basis in writing about courage and writing about honesty – that ask will you really say what you think? Will you really stand up if there’s a more nuanced approach required on a topic even if it doesn’t align directly with one ideology or another? I think we learn a lot of our values and see examples of the kind of morality we want to put forth, in fiction. It’s a good place to explore that.
On improving as a writer
Writing is something you can never perfect. The one thing I would say is very early on I wrote heroes and villains; increasingly I just write protagonists and antagonists. I always want everyone to have a perspective that’s relatable, and the more relatable and smart the antagonist is the more powerful the protagonist is.
The other thing is that when you’re writing a book is that books are the most intimate relationship by far between the writer and the audience. If I sell a million copies of a book, there’s a million different movies playing in everyone’s head. Everyone brings their fears and vulnerabilities and hopes and dreams and aspirations, to a book. What I’m trying to do more and more, is point the reader towards a particular emotion, but leaving enough room that they can fill it with enough room to bring their own experiences to bear. And that’s true for both how fear is developed, how suspense is generated, but also for how other other emotions are generated. You don’t want to tell somebody how to feel or how to think, you want to intimate the direction of it. That’s a dance you try to get better at and better at. Because there’s a dance between me and every single reader and the more that I can build the scaffolding around the sentiment that every reader can individually fill, the better I’m doing. But that’s a skill that takes a lifetime to try and attain.
Gregghurwitz.net
Buy Out of the Dark
January 28, 2018 The Real Book Spy
HELLBENT: Five Questions with Gregg Hurwitz
I do a lot of these Five Questions segments, and try to choose which authors to reach out to based on who readers want to see interviewed. In fact, we take requests via the comment section, email, and even on social media. . .
And then, like with this interview, there are ones I personally can’t wait to do because I’m also a big fan of the author.
Two years ago, when I received an advance copy of Gregg Hurwitz’s first Evan Smoak novel, Orphan X, I remember thinking about how cool the character was right off the bat. Evan, a former child assassin for the CIA, is now living a normal life during the day — often in his luxury penthouse in California.
At night, though, he’s a hard-hitting vigilante in the same vein as the Punisher, known as the Nowhere Man. Whereas other darlings of the genre such as Jason Bourne, Mitch Rapp, and Scot Harvath often live someplace secluded and away from people, Evan hides in plain sight by living amongst others. This creates an entertaining dynamic, and Hurwitz lays it out perfectly.
Whether it’s Evan returning from a mission and having to ride a crowded elevator up to his penthouse while trying to conceal fresh wounds, or him dealing with nosey neighbors who interrupt his work, it all just works so well — and Evan feels real because of it.
Fast forward a year, to December of 2016 — I had just gotten my review copy of Hurwitz’s then-latest Orphan X book, The Nowhere Man. If you’ve followed this site for a while, especially if you follow me on social media, then you know I absolutely loved that book. In fact, it was the first time I ever used the words “near-perfect thriller” in a review. I cannot get enough of Evan Smoak, and Book Spy readers most certainly agree, as Hurwitz’s third book in this series, Hellbent, is one of the most pre-ordered books through our links over the past several months.
Obviously, when given the opportunity to ask Hurwitz a few questions, I leaped at the chance to do so, and tried to ask the questions I thought other fans would want to read the answers to. Thank you to Gregg Hurwitz for agreeing to go on the record here. . . it’s one of my favorite Five Questions segments so far.
Read the Q&A below, then keep scrolling to read more about Hellbent, the all-new, must-read Orphan X thriller that comes out everywhere tomorrow, Tuesday, January 30th.
TRBS: First of all, I have to say that I am a huge fan of your Orphan X series — and so are Book Spy followers! I get more emails, messages, DMs, and Tweets about Evan Smoak than any other character. I’ve always wondered, how did you come up with Evan as a character — and did you plan from the beginning to build a franchise around him?
Hurwitz: “Wow – that’s flattering indeed. The Book Spy followers are the best readers!
“You know, it took me years to come up with Evan. I knew it would be a series from the gates, and I had the notion in the back of my head, but a part of me was almost afraid of it. I kept writing another book first and then another, letting this idea simmer on the back burner. There are so many great characters out there from Jack Reacher to Jason Bourne that I didn’t want to write until I really figured out what differentiated my character from all the others—what would make him an icon deserving of his own place on the proverbial bookshelf. My bible during this time was the transcript of the Spielberg, Lucas, Kasdan conversation when they were developing Indiana Jones. Fifteen novels in, I finally got my mind around that character and Orphan X was born.”
TRBS: No offense to other writers, but a lot of authors seem to keep rolling their series characters out year after year, but their stories all sort of feel the same. That’s not the case with your series. It genuinely feels like you keep finding reasons to tell Evan’s story, which is unique and fun. How did you come up with the plot for Evan’s latest mission in Hellbent?
Hurwitz: “Thank you. Because I wrote so many stand-alones, I think I approach each book from that mindset. After the first two X adventures, I wanted to write Evan’s most personal story yet. And I thought — what if Van Sciver got ahold of the only person Evan really loves. Jack Johns, his handler, was the only person who ever treated Evan like a human being; Jack was his sole connection to humanity. If Jack was threatened, what would Evan be willing to do to avenge him? It started from there. But Jack leaves Evan with one last mission — and that mission will throw a grenade into everything Evan ever thought about himself.”
TRBS: From novels to screenplays and even comics, you’ve kind of written a little of everything. What is your writing process like — and do you ever work on more than one project at a time?
Hurwitz: “I like to put my head down and blast on one project. Then move to the next and do the same. I don’t do as well working on one thing in the morning and something else in the afternoon. But sometimes when deadlines crowd in on me I’m forced to do that. It takes a lot of focus.”
TRBS: A couple of years ago, The Hollywood Reporter reported that Bradly Cooper was in talks to tackle Orphan X for Warner Bros. Are you writing the script for that film, and are there any other updates on the movie?
Hurwitz: “I did write the script and had a great time working on it. In fact, I’m working with Bradley on a TV project as well (Black Flags). But Bradley just directed a feature for the first time—A Star is Born, with Lady Gaga. And he’s also starring in it. So his schedule got a little wonky as actors’ schedules do. I’m figuring out the next move for Orphan X now and hope to have more news to report soon.”
TRBS: Lastly, is it safe to say that readers can expect to see more Evan Smoak in the future?
Hurwitz: “Yes, yes, yes. Unless I get hit by a falling Acme safe.”
Evan Smoak―government assassin gone rogue―returns in Hellbent, an engrossing, unputdownable thriller from Gregg Hurwitz, the latest in his #1 international bestselling Orphan X series.
Taken from a group home at age twelve, Evan Smoak was raised and trained as an off-the-books government assassin: Orphan X. After he broke with the Orphan Program, Evan disappeared and reinvented himself as the Nowhere Man, a man spoken about only in whispers and dedicated to helping the truly desperate.
But this time, the voice on the other end is Jack Johns, the man who raised and trained him, the only father Evan has ever known. Secret government forces are busy trying to scrub the remaining assets and traces of the Orphan Program and they have finally tracked down Jack. With little time remaining, Jack gives Evan his last assignment: find and protect his last protégé and recruit for the program.
But Evan isn’t the only one after this last Orphan―the new head of the Orphan Program, Van Sciver, is mustering all the assets at his disposal to take out both Evan (Orphan X) and the target he is trying to protect.
January 27, 2019 The Real Book Spy
OUT OF THE DARK: Five Questions with Gregg Hurwitz
Since he kicked off his new series in 2016, you’d be hard pressed to find a better thriller franchise going today than Gregg Hurwitz’s Orphan X books.
Now, four books later, Hurwitz’s character, Evan Smoak, is one of the best heroes in the genre . . . and just when it looked like this series couldn’t get any better, Hurwitz pulled the rug out from under readers’ feet with a massive, jaw-dropping reveal in last year’s Hellbent that sets up the biggest, most dangerous, most impossible mission of Smoak’s career.
In my January 2019 CrimeReads column, I wrote that Out of the Dark is the book Gregg Hurwitz will be remembered for, and I stand by that statement. Everything that’s happened over the last three novels has been leading to this, and he delivers in a big way.
Thankfully, Hurwitz agreed to go back on the record for our Five Questions segment this year, and I asked him about everything from how he’ll ever top himself after this to whether or not there’s a movie update he could offer. See the full Q&A below, then make sure to grab a copy of Out of the Dark, the latest action-packed Orphan X novel, in stores January 29th.
TRBS: Without giving anything away . . . this book is amazing. You really outdid yourself! The last three books have all been building to this one. But did you always know that? Did you plan from the very beginning to eventually write this book?
Hurwitz: “I did. I knew where it was aiming. If you go back and read the first three books you’ll see a lot of bread crumbs leading the way to Out of the Dark.”
TRBS: With the way Hellbent ended, the stakes were obviously much higher heading into this book. Was Out of the Dark intimidating to write, and what kind of research did you have to do before actually sitting down to write it?
Hurwitz: “I did a lot of research into the Secret Service and security measures at and around the presidency. This book has so many moving parts and subplots that it should have been hugely intimidating to write but it was actually—bizarrely—a breeze. I’ve had maybe three novels in my career (out of twenty) that I wrote my way through without a hitch and this was one of them. I have no idea why that’s the case. And man I wish it were true for the rest!”
TRBS: Who are some of your favorite authors, and what was the last great book that you read?
Hurwitz: “Too many to name. There’s so much great work out there. I’ll go back to my favorite trinity of writers: William Faulkner, Stephen King, Thomas Harris.
“The last great book I read was The Untethered Soul. It’s about living inside our bodies and our minds and the world—three danger zones we all need help navigating. It helped me break frame to see myself and the way I orient myself in the world in a different fashion. I’d put this on the mindful awareness/meditation track that Orphan X is always practicing in order to better himself.”
TRBS: I read a while back that the Oprhan X movie may have hit a snag. Are there any updates you can share with us?
Hurwitz: “Nothing big yet. But plans are being laid.”
TRBS: Lastly, what could possibly be next for Orphan X, and when can readers expect to see him again?
Hurwitz: “Orphan X needs to seriously regroup after Out of the Dark. It is the biggest mission of his life—and maybe the biggest mission he’ll ever attempt. I think he’ll need some time off drinking vodka and figuring out his place in the universe. But I have a feeling he might be ready to return to the stage sometime around Jan 29, 2020.”
Gregg Hurwitz interview: Renaissance man
Gregg Hurwitz leaps from page to screen to comic book panel in the blink of an eye. But no matter his medium, his end goal is the same: to tell an unforgettable, compelling story you can’t put down.
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Gregg Hurwitz is the true definition of a renaissance author, working in almost every aspect of writing, from film and TV to novels and comics – or even academic articles about William Shakespeare. A New York Times best-selling author of 16 novels, Hurwitz started writing at a young age and hasn’t stopped since. He’s been nominated for numerous awards and has a noted habit of going the extra mile to get his story: Hurwitz has gone swimming with sharks and posed undercover as a cultist in the name of research.
Really, the question is: What hasn’t Gregg Hurwitz done?
When asked about Hurwitz, his publicist, Dana Kaye, says, “I’ve read nearly all of Gregg’s books, and one thing is consistent: He is committed to giving readers a real front-row seat to the action. He jumps out of airplanes, rides Harleys, blows up cars, and hikes through jungles so we don’t have to. And no matter the title, subject, or setting, he always creates a compelling character to tell the story.”
We spoke with Hurwitz about his long, successful, and incredibly versatile writing career.
Gregg Hurwitz on craft
What made you want to start writing? Why the thriller genre?
I don’t remember a time when I didn’t want to write. It is literally the only thing I ever wanted to do (OK, besides play second base for the Red Sox).
Growing up, I used to read Stephen King and Peter Benchley beneath the covers with a flashlight. And when my parents went out, I used to read under the bed, turning the pages with abject terror. I remember thinking: Someday I want to make readers feel this.
Tell us your publishing journey for your first novel.
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I got quite lucky. I started The Tower when I was 19 and wrote most of a (very bad) rough draft in the summers around my senior year of college. I also interned with a producer in Hollywood – an unpaid internship where I worked the entire summer to earn one read from someone whose opinion mattered. I knew when I finished my book I’d need it.
I shipped off to England to do a master’s in Shakespearean tragedy (but really to drink pints, play soccer, and edit my book). When I was done, I mailed it off to claim my one read. Well, the producer liked it and forwarded it on to an entertainment lawyer who she’d worked with. He liked it and offered to fly me to New York to meet with agents. After a few brief detours, we took the book out and Simon & Schuster pre-empted it. I was delighted and immediately vowed to write a minimum of eight hours every day. Given that my dream finally came true, I wasn’t about to waste my window of opportunity. And I’ve honored that vow ever since.
How did you get involved writing in the world of comics? How does someone break into this field?
The editor-in-chief of Marvel had read some of my novels, which deal (rather extensively) with vigilante violence, and he reached out to me to see if I’d be interested in reinventing a character from the Marvel vaults. While my inner geek boy was doing cartwheels, I maintained a calm, professional demeanor and said: YES!
We worked together briefly, and then he offered me my favorite all-time character, the Punisher. What proceeded was an utterly surreal experience at my local comic shop, where I could no longer buy my favorite comic book because I was writing it. From there I went to DC and spent two blissful years writing Batman with some of the greatest artists in the world. It was an amazing run and a total &^%$^! blast.
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How did you end up on the writing staff for the remake of the television series V?
I’d written some pilots for a producer who was currently on V, and I was at his house having a drink and he mentioned that they needed writers for the room, as the show was having some turbulence. He knew that I was busy, but I happened to be between manuscripts and screenplays, and I offered to go in for a meeting. I hit it off with the show runner (who remains a great friend) and wound up doing a ton of writing and learning an enormous amount about production. Episode 106 of season one was my first official produced credit.
How different is your writing process between novels, screenplays, and comics? What is the same?
I feel like they’re different muscles. It helps if you’re in good writing shape overall, certainly, but each exercise takes a particular focus. With books you can go inside a character’s mind – basically pull on their mask and see the world through their eyeholes. And you have a lot more room for exposition (though novelists shouldn’t wear out their welcome on this front) and more ways to get information into the story. Screenplays are much leaner – you have fewer pages and much less space on those pages. So you have to figure out how to convey information succinctly and visually. Comics are leaner yet – now you have to tell a story in four to six snapshots per page, so you better choose ‘em wisely.
The Book of Henry comes out this summer. How did you end up writing the screenplay and getting Colin Trevorrow as the director?
I wrote the rough draft 19 years ago. I’ve edited this screenplay more times than I can count, rewriting it as I grew more mature (I hope), as I became a parent, as I gained new insights into life. So I’ve really grown up with this screenplay, and I have to say, it taught me that there’s little worth doing that doesn’t require inspiration, dedication, and perspiration. Colin and I hit it off after his first movie (Safety Not Guaranteed) came out. I had him attached, and we were trying to figure out how to move forward with it when he got the call from Steven Spielberg to direct Jurassic World. I knew I would lose him to that, but he was very direct and honest and called to tell me himself. During the call, he said, “You never know, maybe Jurassic will be a big hit, and I can come back and we can get The Book of Henry greenlit.” And I thought, yeah, right. Two years later, there we were, standing in New York on the first day of production.
How did you get the gig for the upcoming HBO series Black Flags, based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning book?
I’d worked with Bradley Cooper and Todd Phillips adapting my novel Orphan X, and we really got along well. My agent called to tell me that there was a book in play about the rise of ISIS, and did I want to give it a read? I got the book at 8 p.m. the night before I was supposed to have the meeting. I thought there was no way I could get through it, but once I hit page 30, I couldn’t put the thing down. I went into the meeting the next day humming with excitement, and my take lined up with Bradley and Todd’s. They flew me to New York to meet Joby Warrick, the author, and to pitch Tim Van Patten, who directed the Game of Thrones pilot and a ton of Sopranos episodes. We all got along well, and some weeks later, back in LA, we brought it in to HBO. While we were negotiating our deal, it won the Pulitzer. Joby’s a world-class talent and human, so I was delighted for him. It’s a real honor to adapt it.
Who is Orphan X? Will we see Bradley Cooper playing him in the future?
[From Orphan X:] “He was in his mid-thirties and quite fit, though not so muscular that he stood out. Just an average guy, not too handsome.”
Right now, Bradley and Todd are attached to produce my screenplay adaptation. Final casting for features is always contingent on schedules, planets aligning, and other madness.
With your diversity both in what you write and the various mediums in which you dabble, what is the “Gregg Hurwitz brand?”
At the end of the day, everything comes down to compelling story. If I’ve made you unable to put down one of my books or comics, or unable to get up from your seat when you’re watching, I’ve done my job.
How does your master’s degree from Trinity College, Oxford, in Shakespearean tragedy help you craft your stories?
At the end of the day, Shakespeare wrote narrative-driven, highly structured, convention-bound tales of lust, intrigue, and murder. In other words, he wrote thrillers. Almost all of his stories existed in some form already, but he managed to inhabit these familiar worlds, write them from the inside out, and elevate them beyond what anyone had seen before.
That’s always the goal.
What does it take for a writer to have access and success in the world of TV and film?
Ass-in-chair time. Day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year. You’d better not merely want to be a writer. You’d better love the writing.
What advice would you have for a writer pursuing the dream?
Read my answer above. And then read a thousand novels and/or a thousand screenplays. Never stop reading. Never stop learning. Never stop striving to be better.
Hurwitz, Gregg INTO THE FIRE Minotaur (Adult Fiction) $27.99 1, 28 ISBN: 978-1-250-12045-8
This fifth in the Orphan X series (Out of the Dark, 2019, etc.) features one deadly crisis after another for a killer who'd really just like to retire and become human.
In a spectacular opening scene, a man who has supposedly rescued rich businessman Grant Merriweather from a car crash and brought him to an urgent-care facility pulls out a gun and murders him along with the doctors who helped him regain consciousness. Now the bad guys are after Merriweather's downtrodden cousin Max, whom most of his family doesn't like and "no one would miss." Meanwhile, Evan Smoak is Orphan X, or the Nowhere Man. He was raised and trained as a killer for a secret government program but has been entirely on his own for years. A desperate person who calls his secret number, 1-855-2-NOWHERE, will hear him say, Do you need my help?" Then, if he so chooses, he will take any risk to help that stranger. Evan receives technical help from smart-mouthed 16-year-old genius geek Joey, who can hack into anything and even control surveillance cameras. The plot unfolds in the same pattern as the first four in the series: Evan slays bad guys with uncanny skill, but, like a bloody game of whack-a-mole, the threats keep popping up. What makes this mission different is that he wants it to be his last. The government has been trying to eliminate him--lots of backstory there--and now retirement is beckoning. If only he could sit in his elaborate condo and sip CLIX vodka while he heals from his numerous concussions. Evan is devoid of social skills, and it's fun to watch him dodge small talk with his homeowners association. Other men had once chosen his life and molded him into a killer. Now he'd like "a life of his own making," but "without the Nowhere Man, who the hell was Evan Smoak?" Give him a day with his boring neighbors and he'll un-retire in a hurry.
Kudos to Hurwitz for creating this series. Let's hope the Nowhere Man's phone rings again.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2019 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Source Citation
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Hurwitz, Gregg: INTO THE FIRE." Kirkus Reviews, 15 Nov. 2019. Gale General OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A605549545/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=552f878f. Accessed 6 Dec. 2019.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A605549545
Hurwitz, Gregg OUT OF THE DARK Minotaur (Adult Fiction) $27.99 1, 29 ISBN: 978-1-250-12042-7
Evan Smoak aims high in this fourth bloody installment in the fast-moving Orphan X series (Hellbent, 2018, etc.).
Evan is Orphan X, and he is on a daunting mission: "Killing the President was going to be a lot of work." To be sure, the morally corrupt President Bennett is trying to cover up his crimes by wiping out everyone in the darker than dark Orphan program that he once oversaw. The two men know they're out to get each other, and Bennett is "the most inaccessible and heavily guarded man on the face of the planet." Further, Secret Service Special Agent in Charge Naomi Templeton is given the job of protecting him against X, so simply shooting up a presidential motorcade won't cut it. Meanwhile, there's a distinct subplot--fans already know that Orphan X is the Nowhere Man, who helps certain people who call his encrypted cellphone. This time the desperate caller is Trevon Gaines, who's found his entire immediate family slaughtered but is kept alive by the drug-smuggling killers who call him a "retard." Trevon is a highly sympathetic character who notices precise details wherever he looks, only eats yellow or orange food, and frets about the "Scaredy Bugs" in his head. Protecting him and his lone remaining relative is a side job for Orphan X that lets him do what he does best: kill a lot of criminals. Oh yeah, and there's a dude called Orphan A who doesn't have his fellow orphan's best interests at heart. The plotting is clever, the action is nearly constant and usually over-the-top, and X has something resembling a moral core. Bad guys get what bad guys deserve, and we don't need no stinkin' due process.
Hurwitz fans will certainly enjoy this latest entry in the series, while those unfamiliar with it might like to read the books in order. They'll be hooked.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2018 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Source Citation
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Hurwitz, Gregg: OUT OF THE DARK." Kirkus Reviews, 1 Nov. 2018. Gale General OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A560344841/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=06e4ce5c. Accessed 6 Dec. 2019.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A560344841
Into the Fire
Gregg Hurwitz. Minotaur, $27.99 (400p) ISBN 978-1-250-12045-8
In bestseller Hurwitz's adrenaline-charged fifth Orphan X novel (after 2019's Out of the Dark), forensic accountant Grant Merriweather leaves his cousin Max Merriweather an envelope to be delivered to an L.A. Times reporter in the event of his murder. But when Grant and the reporter are both killed, Max turns to Evan Smoak, the Nowhere Man, for help. The envelope contains a flash drive with spreadsheets that Evan and his hacker protege, Josephine Morales, are able to determine contain a money laundering scheme that ranges through L.A.'s criminal underworld. Early on, Evan is surprised by a gunman, and, while Evan survives, he suffers a concussion that hinders his combat abilities, but not so much that he hesitates to rescue Max from a police station or get himself jailed in order to get to a kingpin behind bars. Meanwhile, Hurwitz continues to explore Evan's nascent relationship with assistant district attorney Mia Hall, adding some complexity. By layering his nonstop action with character development, Hurwitz has created a terrific tale. 150.000-copy announced first printing: author tour. Agent: Lisa Erbacb Vance. Aaron Priest Literary. (Jan.)
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2019 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Source Citation
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Into the Fire." Publishers Weekly, 28 Oct. 2019, p. 79. Gale General OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A605790149/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=3f8ae314. Accessed 6 Dec. 2019.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A605790149
Out of the Dark.
By Gregg Hurwitz.
Jan. 2019.400p. Minotaur, $27.99 (9781250120427); e-book, $14.99 (9781250120441).
Evan Smoak roars back with a vengeance in the fourth Orphan X thriller. Smoak, a former assassin for the U.S. government (he now comes to the aid of people who need his special skills to solve their problems), has decided that there's only one way to avoid suffering the deadly fate of several of his fellow Orphans: he must kill the man who set in motion the plan to exterminate the Orphans and, thus, erase the programs existence. There's one small hiccup, though: the man behind the plan is now the president of the U.S., the most protected person in the world. Given that each entry in the Orphan series finds Evan tackling his most difficult mission so far, one might think that, by the fourth time around, the author might be falling into the trap of so many movie sequels that must be bigger and more explosive than what came before. But, no: this installment is as tightly plotted, efficiently written, and, yes, as curiously plausible as its predecessors. If Jack Reacher fans haven't checked out Smoak yet, they're missing a sure bet.--David Pitt
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2018 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist/
Source Citation
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Pitt, David. "Out of the Dark." Booklist, 15 Oct. 2018, p. 26. Gale General OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A559688093/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=50e2bceb. Accessed 6 Dec. 2019.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A559688093
Hurwitz, Greg HELLBENT Minotaur (Adult Fiction) $25.99 1, 30 ISBN: 978-1-250-11917-9
Bodies pile up in the third entry in the Orphan X series (Nowhere Man, 2017, etc.).
Orphan X, now Evan Smoak, is the Nowhere Man. People, usually strangers, can call him on his untraceable phone to ask for help if they are in desperate trouble. So his father figure, Jack Johns, calls him shortly before stepping out of a flying helicopter to his death. Then Evan receives Jack's posthumous note about a "final mission" to get a "package" that turns out to be Joey, a testy teenage girl and fellow Orphan who at first tries to kill him. Meanwhile, Charles Van Sciver, Director of the Orphan Program, is hellbent on his own mission. His "top priority [is] to stamp out wayward Orphans," especially Orphan X, the one who escaped from the program. Evan obsesses about killing Van Sciver and everyone else who helped kill Jack, so rivers of blood surge toward a showdown. Joey becomes Evan's sidekick, but she might become an "inconvenient aggravation at the very moment that Evan's universe would compress down in the service of a single goal--the annihilation of Charles Van Sciver." There's the hint of a sequel with Van Sciver's taunt to Evan--"You have no idea, do you? How high it goes?" That's thriller-talk for Someone Living on Pennsylvania Avenue. And that Someone also wants Evan dead. All this slaughtering keeps him too busy for a love life, although he has an almost-girlfriend, DA Mia Hall. Another woman hits on him, but he "needed to get food, and then he had people to kill." Priorities, you know. Some characters will be familiar to readers of the series, such as Van Sciver and the voluptuous but deadly Candy McClure. Most colorful, though, is the gangster named Freeway, who has--oh yeah!--a tattooed eyeball.
As well-done as the rest of the series and bloody good fun.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Source Citation
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Hurwitz, Greg: HELLBENT." Kirkus Reviews, 15 Nov. 2017. Gale General OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A514267708/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=d0c2c5c2. Accessed 6 Dec. 2019.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A514267708
Hellbent. By Gregg Hurwitz. Jan. 2018.416p. Minotaur, $26.99 (9781250119179); e-book, $12.99 (9781250119186).
Hurwitz sets himself quite a challenge in the latest Evan Smoak thriller: he gives the lone-wolf former government assassin a sidekick. And not just any sidekick: a precocious 16-year-old girl, a former assassin-in-training named Joey. But if you're worrying that this book trades intense suspense and slam-bang action for sappy sitcom moments, you can stop. This is a great novel, perhaps the darkest in the series so far. Sent into a single-minded rage by the death of his mentor, the only person he has ever cared about, Evan vows to track down and eradicate the man responsible: Charles Van Sciver, current head of the top-secret Orphan Program (before Evan went rogue, he was Orphan X). The question he must answer is, If it comes down to it, will he sacrifice the life of a girl he barely knows to satisfy his primal need for revenge? Until Evan makes that decision, we really don't know what he will do--that's the beauty and brilliance of the character Hurwitz has created. The story moves as fast as a bullet train, and we've never seen Evan Smoak as emotionally exposed as he is here. Do not miss this one.--David Pitt
[HD] HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Hurwitz and his Evan Smoak thrillers have been steadily growing in popularity, and this one will accelerate the pace dramatically.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist/
Source Citation
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Pitt, David. "Hellbent." Booklist, 1 Oct. 2017, p. 31. Gale General OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A510653768/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=11c94c85. Accessed 6 Dec. 2019.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A510653768
Hurwitz, Gregg LAST CHANCE Tor Teen (Children's Fiction) $17.99 10, 17 ISBN: 978-0-7653-8269-6
After an alien invasion, the survival of humanity depends on teenage brothers.At the close of series opener The Rains (2016), Chance and his older brother, Patrick, were separated, and Chance encountered an alien rebel who told him that humanity's fate depends on his staying out of the aliens' clutches. As this book opens, he's been caught, and an alien scan identifies him. Although readers are tossed quickly into the action, a brief synopsis reminds them of the spores that turned those over 18 into mindless workers who prepared Earth for the arrival of the alien Drones and Queens who, with assistance from the already-turned Hosts, round up kids and teens and make them into Husks that incubate the alien Hatchlings. Patrick and his girlfriend--whom Chance also loves--arrive and rescue him, and the three flee to their high school, where survivors have established a base of operations and where a thinly developed bully character represents the man-is-the-true-danger figure that all post-apocalyptic books seem to need these days (this storyline is exceptionally forced). Alien rebels reveal how to stop the invasion and its required cost--which has been telegraphed in the novel's epigraph, leaving no surprises. The novel's conceit--that it's been written by Chance as journal entries--distracts, but the endless action is solid. The narrative defaults to white, with exceptions identified by ethnicity (a Tongan ranch hand) or name (Dr. Chatterjee). Predictable and plot-driven. (Post-apocalyptic adventure. 12-18)
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Source Citation
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Hurwitz, Gregg: LAST CHANCE." Kirkus Reviews, 15 Aug. 2017. Gale General OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A500364871/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=40add082. Accessed 6 Dec. 2019.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A500364871
Hurwitz, Gregg THE NOWHERE MAN Minotaur (Adult Fiction) $25.99 1, 17 ISBN: 978-1-250-06785-2
The high-energy and hairy-chested sequel to Orphan X (2016).Evan Smoak used to be Orphan X, a product of a "deep-black" Department of Defense project. Now that Evan's on his own, he's become the Nowhere Man with a bulging Swiss bank account, amazing killing skills, and the itch to rescue people who call for his help. Evan's nemesis, Charles Van Sciver, is a fellow Orphan and mortal enemy with a mission to kill former Orphans because they know too much. Specifically, his "profoundly personal" mission is to kill Evan. So far, that's standard good-guy vs. bad-guy fare with the promise of a high body count. But a couple of colorful characters add to the fun: Candy McClure, a superhot centerfold babe from the anterior and a Freddy Krueger look-alike from the posterior. For the latter she can thank Evan and a lot of hydrofluoric acid. Ouch! And there is Rene Cassaroy, who has the rare AB blood type and is obsessed with living forever. When the Need rages and gnashes inside him, his doctor infuses him with blood from captive children, part of his anti-aging regimen. To finance this Need, he wants Evan to wire him all his money. But Evan is no pushover; in a fight, his "body coiled and exploded into a Superman punch." As an awestruck foe reports, "Guy was like a typhoon. It was pretty insane." Give him a weapon, and he's even worse: in one fight, Evan severs an enemy's hand with piano wire. Evan dispatches a villain called the Great White Sark who lies in a heap, "his face and chest missing as if scooped out....Impossibly, he wiggled." When, late in the book, Van Sciver is asked if it's OK to kill Evan if necessary, the answer by now should be obvious--go for it, but lotsa luck. Thriller fans craving action and violence will enjoy this one.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Source Citation
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Hurwitz, Gregg: THE NOWHERE MAN." Kirkus Reviews, 1 Feb. 2017. Gale General OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A479234744/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=625bd37b. Accessed 6 Dec. 2019.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A479234744
HURWITZ, Gregg. Last Chance. 384p. Tor Teen. Oct. 2017. Tr $17.99. ISBN 9780765382696. POP
Gr 7 Up--Following phase one of the spore invasion that turned everyone 18 and older into vicious inhuman beings in The Rains, this sequel is an edge-of-your seat test of constant survival. The Hosts, adults transformed into unrecognizable monsters, paved the way for the invaders and turned the small town of Creek's Cause into a world only found in nightmares. Finding refuge in the local high school after the invasion, Chance and Patrick Rain continue the struggle to survive and keep the rest of the "under eighteen-year-olds" safe and orderly. Facing opposition, the two brothers, along with Alex, Patrick's girlfriend, work together to find a "cure" that will save the others from being turned into ferocious monsters the minute they turn 18. Not only do the survivors of the first attack have to fight the Hosts; now a new breed of predatory creatures has spawned and spread across the world, devouring all living things in its path. Chance is discovered by alien rebels who reveal how to stop the invasion and its required cost. This installment continues the fast-paced action of the first book in the series. Fresh writing and characterization sets this work apart from other zombie novels. VERDICT A definite purchase where the first book is popular. If the first book isn't already in the library, it should be.--Amy Caldera, Dripping Springs Middle School, TX
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 Library Journals, LLC. A wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/
Source Citation
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Caldera, Amy. "Hurwitz, Gregg. Last Chance." School Library Journal, Oct. 2017, p. 100+. Gale General OneFile, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A507950793/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=11cf976d. Accessed 6 Dec. 2019.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A507950793