Mayday

By: Nelson DeMille, Thomas Block

Narrated by: Scott Brick

Length: 13 hrs and 15 mins

Publisher's summary

Twelve miles above the Pacific Ocean, a missile strikes a jumbo passenger jet and leaves the flight crew either crippled or dead. This is the story of how three survivors must achieve the impossible and land the plane. Master storyteller Nelson DeMille and veteran pilot Thomas Block collaborated on Mayday, the most terrifyingly realistic air disaster thriller of all time.

©1979, 1998 by Thomas H. Block and Nelson DeMille, All Rights Reserved (P)16 9; 1998 Time Warner AudioBooks, A Division of Time Warner Trade Publishing

Critic reviews

"Strong and electric!" (Washington Post)
"Truly horrific...delicious terror. Mayday is a novel for the true connoisseur of disaster novels." (The New York Times Book Review)

Exciting and dramatic!!

Very exciting. Even though I could kind of figure out how it was supposed to end, it kept me up listening intently for the next chapter.

Mayday, Nelson DeMillie/Thomas Block

Any additional comments?

The story was not bad but did not enjoy the narrator. Won't listen again to this story.

Enthralling!

Intense action and deep character development. Kept me enthralled through several days of rush hour commuting. The narrator added so much to the story with his real life speech, emotion, pauses, etc. The only reason I took one star off the story rating was b/c there are long sections of moral contemplation. I kept wishing we could skip the thinking and get back to the action! But the morality and understanding their choices was an integral part of the story. Totally LOVED this book. If the narrator performed any other books in this genre I'll be buying them.

Spellbinding!!

This story made me go through a whole range of emotions. I was horrified, appalled, angry, disgusted, sad, and happy to name a few. I was on the "edge of my seat" the whole read. There were times I wanted to hear more and times when I didn't want to hear any more. Wonderfully written! Well worth getting.

must listen

loved it from start to finish. By chapter 2 you won't want to stop listening

Some good some bad

Whilst the story idea is certainly riveting and would likely be a good read, the robotic narration accentuates the use of awkward metaphors and glaring cliches. A better narrator may have done this novel more justice, as it sounded like a computer was speaking at times. It was enjoyable nonetheless, but I don't think it is DeMille's best. I half wished that some of the painfully extended dialogue could have been replaced with a better conclusion better describing the aftermath and repurcussion of the events. I would recommend the book, but would warn again the audiobook unless you're willing to put up with the bad narrator (I suggest use the preview first).

Riveting, nail biting suspense

The book opens with the statement if you are on a plane do not read this book. Apparently it is a remake of a book from the 70's they updated it and it was also made into a TV movie. The story grabs you from the beginning and the story goes into one problem or disaster to another and there is just no good place to put the book down. A missile hits a super sonic passenger jet at 62,000 feet and the plane decompressed, some passenger die and some are have oxygen deprived brain disorder only 5 people are functioning and one is a civilian pilot. I won't give the story away but you will find you can not stop listening. There is enough real world situation to the story to make one think about flying but enough is far fetched to keep one going to the airport to catch a plane.

Great Book -- Suspenseful -- Nice plot.

Great book. I'm into Airplane type books and suspense novels. The authors involve corporate and military scandals in which a layperson would never think of.

Updated for modern date and quite good.

Although the original was published some years ago, the story has been updated to modern age. Without this revision it would have been dated, with it its a very good thriller. You have the typical story of a unexperienced pilot flying a modern jetliner, but also several twists have been added to increase the "thrill". Telling would give it away, so I won't. I was slightly hesitant when I added this book, but in the end I could not stop listening. As usual, Scott Brick does an excellent job at narration. If you like flight books, you will love this. If not, it's just a good plain (sorry for pun) thriller.

Wow

I had to say something. This is the best audio book I have downloaded to this date and I download a lot. This is a page turner you won't want to shut off. The plot twists and turns are things most wouldn't think of. After not even finishing my last two downloads, this one made up for the recent turkeys. I almost did not get this as I thought oh well, a plane disaster. I thought I had seen the movie. NOT! This is different and you will want to kill some people after hearing it. Kudos to the authors. Great Job.