Hidden Prey: Lucas Davenport 15

By John Sandford

A Lucas Davenport thriller by internationally bestselling novelist John Sandford.

Theories abound when a Russian gets himself killed on the shore of Lake Superior - not just killed, but shot with fifty-year-old bullets. And his identity remains a secret: his personal papers say one thing; the FBI thinks something else entirely -- ex-KGB.

Whoever he is, the dead man had very high government connections, so Lucas Davenport gets the call to investigate. Well, Lucas and a mysterious Russian cop with secrets all her own. Together, they'll follow a trail back to another place and another time, and battle the shadows they discover there... shadows that turn out to be both very real and very deadly. Because someone with an unknowable agenda and a very old grudge has every reason to want the dead Russian to remain unidentified... and will do whatever it takes to keep Lucas and his new partner from revealing the truth of their hidden prey.

***READERS LOVE THE PREY SERIES***
 
'The best Lucas Davenport story so far. The man has a fine touch for outlaws' Stephen King on Golden Prey

'Sandford’s trademark blend of rough humor and deadly action keeps the pages turning until the smile-inducing wrap-up, which reveals the fates of a number of his quirky, memorable characters' Publishers Weekly on Golden Prey

'It appears there is no limit to John Sandford’s ability to keep new breath and blood flowing into his Lucas Davenport series. This is a series you must be reading if you are not already' Bookreporter.com

'Sandford has always been at the top of any list of great mystery writers. His writing and the appeal of his lead character are as fresh as ever' The Huffington Post

'Sandford is consistently brilliant' Cleveland Plain Dealer

• Language: English
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster UK
• Release date: Jan 24, 2019
• ISBN: 9781471181955

John Sandford

John Sandford is the pseudonym for the Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist John Camp. He is the author of thirty Prey novels, four Kidd novels, twelve Virgil Flowers novels, and six other books, including three YA novels coauthored with his wife Michele Cook.

Reviews for Hidden Prey

[carlathelibrarian · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I have read all of the prey series up to this point and I have to say, this was the least favourite so far. A Russian sailor is killed on the docks in Duluth Minnesota. A homeless woman witnesses the crime. A Russian business man wants the Russians to pursue this with the Americans so the FBI and the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension are called upon to soothe ruffled feathers and see if they can solve the crime. Of course this involves Lucas Davenport. Suddenly others are being killed and Lucas is searching for a witness, a connection to a Communist Cell and trying to keep the Russians and FBI happy. Lots of law enforcement involved from various towns, a little bit of a love interest for one of the cops and Lucas solves the crime, but not without some sad deaths that leave Lucas a little miserable. A little different from the other prey books. I am hoping the next one goes back to his regular type of stories.

[kathy89_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Perverted killer with an assumed identity is viciously abducting and killing people. Agents Davenport and Sloan are interesting characters but this is not my type of mystery.

[readafew · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

John Sandford writes great detective mysteries. His prey novels are all about the charactor Davenport. The mysteries generally deal with serial killers in and around the twin cities.This book takes place primarily in the Iron Range (northern Minnesota). In this book Sandford is braching out into spies and espionage. I am not so sure this is a good idea for him. It makes me fear he's running out of good ideas to throw at Davenport and is going to start escalating things to ridiculous levels. This book was fine but I hope he's careful about future cases.

[sunnysd_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

When a Russian freighter docks in the Cities, no one cares. Not until one of the Russians gets extremely dead and it appears he wasn't exactly what he seemed, that is. Lucas, with some help from a beautiful foreign agent, is on the case.Far-fetched and entertaining as always.

[audryh_2 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Gripping mystery of aging cell of Russian spies, the leader of whom trains his great-grandson to become a lethal killer.

[mcmurria · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I enjoyed this book but I would have enjoyed it more if there was less bad language. I liked that we knew who the killer was the whole time and we were with the police while they tried to figure out who dun it. It is about a boy whos family came to the U.S. to be spies. Generations of spies have dwindled, but this boys grandfather is teaching him how to get rid of people that he thinks are interfearing with their purpose,

[jepeters333 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A Russian gets killed up in Duluth, and Lucas Davenport meets a Russian cop up there. There are more murders by a radical Communist group that lost contact with the motherland long ago.

[carl_alves_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

In Hidden Prey, teenager Carl Walther murders a Russian, who winds up at a dock in Duluth, Minnesota. Detective Lucas Davenport is given the task of escorting Nadya Kalin, an investigator sent from the Russian government to work on the case. The investigation leads to Carl’s elderly grandfather, who is a former KGB operative. There isn’t a big mystery as to who the killer is, since it is revealed pretty early. The novel follows both Carl and the investigation of the crime until they come to a head.Although the book was fairly well written and had some decent intrigue to it, there is also a serious lack of believability to the novel. Much of it involves the presence of sleeper agents from the old Cold War days. That aspect of it was hard to swallow, and since there wasn’t much mystery to the murder, the novel falls a bit flat. Still there was a solid entertainment component to it. This isn’t a must read, but you could do worse.Carl Alves – author of Blood Street

[mrtall_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Possibly the weakest of the otherwise excellent series of Prey novels. The murder/spies/thriller combo plot gets out of hand, and there are too many characters to care about.

[joannsmithainsworth · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Kept its fast pace all the way through. Constant build to an ending I didn’t expect.

[jfhilborne · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Hidden Prey starts out with the murder of a Russian on the Duluth docks. Detective Lucas Davenport of the Minnesota BCA (Bureau of Criminal Apprehension) is assigned the case. The Russian government sends their own investigator, Nadya Kalin, to work alongside Davenport. The plot concerns a group of Communist spies now living in Minnesota, and from the beginning, Davenport is suspicious of Kalin. The reader knows upfront who killed the Russian. What we don't know is why? We find out as Davenport unearths the family trees and traces the collaborators to their origins. When Kalin herself becomes a target, Davenport must prevent certain aspects of the attempt on her life from reaching the ears of senior officials.The relationship with Kalin and Davenport is interesting. She is a mystery to him, which makes the novel more humorous in parts. It's an unlikely plotline that seems for the most part to work, though the ending may leave some readers unenthusiastic and questioning whether there are actually any villains. While gruesome in parts, it is not dark or sadistic. The pace is slow and focuses mostly on the investigation/interrogation of witnesses. As we know the identity of the killer, and the author tells us throughout who all the players in the crimes are, there is an overall lack of suspense, making it difficult to class this as a mystery or a thriller. However, it is an entertaining read, with good characters and good dialogue. 3.5 stars

[wcath · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

John Sandford is still going strong in the fifteenth installment of the Lucas Davenport series. Would have liked to see more than a hint that Letty (from the previous book) was living with Weather and Lucas. I was so happy to see that her character was still around and then... she's away on a school trip... for the whole book?? What's up with that? Still a good, strong book.

[debavp · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I think this may have been the shortest book by Sandford, yet took me the longest to read. Davenport is bored and I'm bored, and while I think it's a deliberate act, not an unintended consequence of Sandford's writing, something's gotta give. Lucas is not the stay home with the wife and kids kind of guy and although he's aging, his brain is craving something to challenge it. I hope, for both our sakes, he finds something soon.

[sonicquack · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

If you've never read a Lucas Davenport crime novel, the good news is that you jump in anywhere you like. Each book is self-contained, with a relationships and politics spanning the series with little effect on the main stories. Hidden Prey is a great place to start.It's a well driven plot, with twists and turns, great new characters and is compulsive reading. As ever, the body count rises and Lucas, our sarcastic and beloved hero, is clearly on form. If anyone throught the series was stale than this is a sign that Sandford knows how to reenergise an old formula and can inject life in to Lucas's aging bones yet. There are moments of great humour as well as suspense, a page turner until the end.