Jack Swyteck’s new girlfriend,Mia, is keeping secrets from thelove-struck Miami attorney,not the least of which is a wealthy and powerful husband. Then Miais kidnapped by a manipulativeabductor who makes a chilling ransom request, “Pay me what she’s worth.” Now Jack’s the one underthe gun, since Mia’s spouse has decided his unfaithful wife is worth nothing. Time is of the essence, and if Jack picks the wrong number,Mia could end up like thekidnapper’s other victims: dead.
Barbara Taylor Bradford
Every woman will read Got the Look. . . and wonder.
James Patterson
If you haven’t read James Grippando, start with Got the Look....Grippando is really good.
Steve Berry
Grippando is a major talent and here he’s strutting his considerable stuff.
Romantic Times
Never-ending suspense, romance and deceit form the backbone of this expertly plotted novel.
Booklist
Grippando has a great feel for pacing and writes highly effective, gripping action scenes.
Miami Herald
Got the Look features a remarkably rich premise, an unrelenting pace, solid characterizations and surprising but logical twists.
Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel
Realistic characters worth caring about and tense chase scenes add to Got the Look‘s intriguing tale.
San Jose Mercury News
If you go with Grippando, you’ll get a plot you won’t soon forget.
Orlando Sentinel
Stunning revelations and a powerhouse ending.
Publishers Weekly
Attorney Jack Swyteck and his jazz musician sidekick Theo Knight josh, joke and kid, but unfortunately the case they're working-the kidnapping of Jack's girlfriend by a sadistic murderer-doesn't lend itself to humor. The disconnect of monkeyshines versus the grim, detailed torture of a helpless woman cripples this thinly plotted, disappointing thriller set in Grippando's familiar South Florida. The girlfriend in question, the gorgeous Mia Salazar, turns out to be (unknown to Jack) married. After she's been seized, her betrayed husband makes it clear that he has no interest in paying any significant ransom. This duty then falls to Jack, who, working with FBI agent Andie Henning (reprised from Under Cover of Darkness), frantically tries to find Mia. Though Jack and Andie are the proverbial oil and water, the results of this pairing are entirely predictable. And when the kidnapper is finally revealed, his identity is as unbelievable as the tortured reasoning that attempts to connect the many disparate plot elements. The chase scene at the end lends some much-needed firepower, but it's too little too late for anyone but the most diehard Grippando fan. (On sale Jan. 3) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.
Library Journal
What is the price of a human life? That is the central question confronting Florida lawyer Jack Swyteck as he grapples with kidnapping and treachery. He's just beginning to believe that new girlfriend Mia Salazar might be the one when he discovers she's married. Jack dumps her and, while licking his wounds, finds out that she is the latest victim of a serial kidnapper. Or has her husband killed her and faked the entire incident? Jack must use all of his instincts to uncover the truth, even if he doesn't like the answers. Fans of legal thrillers will devour this novel; first-time readers of former trial lawyer Grippando (Hear No Evil) and the Swyteck series will not feel left out. Jack is a wonderful character, and the main mystery is both puzzling and shocking. For all fiction collections. [See Prepub Alert, LJ 10/15/05.]-Jeff Ayers, Seattle P.L. Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.
Kirkus Reviews
Coral Gables lawyer Jack Swyteck celebrates his tenth appearance by getting involved with a lady who's so hot that she can't possibly be anything but trouble. Wealthy Venezuelan-born businessman Ernesto Salazar can have whatever he wants. When his wife Mia is kidnapped by someone who demands only that he "pay what she's worth"-the last victim was left to die when her husband's guess of $1,000,000 turned out to be too low-he has the option of delivering the ransom himself or having the FBI take care of it. Or he can thumb his nose at the demand because his cheating wife is literally worthless. Instead, Salazar finds a more intriguing choice for the role of bagman: Jack, who's become Mia's lover. It doesn't speak very highly for Jack that he's somehow managed to survive nine big cases (Hear No Evil, 2004, etc.) without being able to tell that the lovely he's been carrying on a torrid romance with is married. But now he has bigger problems. One is how to behave when he's caught between an abductor who's shown no compunction about killing and a victim's husband who's just as clever and ruthless. Another is what to do when Salazar comes up short on the ransom and the kidnapper battens on Jack as Mia's last hope. A third is how he's going to match wits with Andie Henning, an FBI negotiator who's fled her own problems in Seattle, and extricate himself from a climactic, and eventually anticlimactic, sequence that seems to go on longer than Flash Gordon Conquers the Universe. The book on Grippando-that he sacrifices character, logic and plausibility to storytelling drive-has never been more accurate. Not one in a hundred of this tale's big target audience will ever read it twice.
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