Before the Fall - Noah Hawley

I don't like this kind of book. But this time I am making a H U G E exception because this is a really good read, a page turner, a book which every so often made me gasp and say "no!". Noah Hawley is the man who wrote the scipt for the TV series "Fargo", and I didn't watch that because I loved the film. Now I wish I had because this was a real rollercoaster of a read, a book that gave me all the info I needed, page by page, and by the end, had me attempting to speed read the last half a dozen pages even though I knew from the first chapter that there had been a plane crash, and there were only two survivors.

There are some great but flawed characters here including Gus, the investigator for airline safety, who is cold and mechanical on the surface, but needs to get everything right so that mistakes are not glossed over; Scott, recovering alchoholic and one of the two survivors; Bill, the news reporter who is actually a shock jockey who made it to TV - and who made a fortune for the company that employed him. David, the CEO of that company, who should have retired but loves the thrill of business. Every character gets plenty of pages, we learn what makes them tick, we take decisions on whether we like them or not, we dismiss them as not important when maybe they are? And, very near the end of the book we find out how the plane went down. I read the 400 pages in 24 hours - could not put it down. High praise from me, a reader who does not like thrillers.