The Third Bullet

Publisher Marketing: It s not even a clue. It s a whisper, a trace, a ghost echo, drifting down through the decades via chance connections so fragile that they would disintegrate in the puff of a breath. But it s enough to get legendary former Marine sniper Bob Lee Swagger interested in the events of November 22, 1963, and the third bullet that so decisively ended the life of John F. Kennedy and set the stage for one of the most enduring controversies of our time. Swagger begins his slow night stalk through a much-traveled landscape. But he s asking questions that few have asked before: Why did the third bullet explode? Why did Lee Harvey Oswald, about to become the most hunted man on earth, risk it all by returning to his rooming house to secure a pistol he easily could have brought with him? How could a conspiracy that went unpenetrated for fifty years have been thrown together in the two and a half days between the announcement of the president s route and the assassination itself? As Bob investigates, another voice enters the narrative: knowing, ironic, almost familiar, that of a gifted, Yale-educated veteran of the CIA Plans Division. Hugh Meachum has secrets and the means and the will to keep them buried. When weighed against his own legacy, Swagger s life is an insignificant expense but to blunt the threat, he ll first have to ambush the sniper. As each man hunts the other across today s globe and through the thickets of history, "The Third Bullet" builds to an explosive climax that will finally prove what Bob Lee Swagger has always known: it s never too late for justice." Review Citations: Library Journal Prepub Alert 08/01/2012 pg. 53 (EAN 9781451640205, Hardcover) Library Journal 09/15/2012 pg. 62 (EAN 9781451640205, Hardcover) - *Starred Review Booklist 10/01/2012 pg. 38 (EAN 9781451640205, Hardcover) - *Starred Review Publishers Weekly 10/22/2012 (EAN 9781451640205, Hardcover) Kirkus Reviews 11/15/2012 (EAN 9781451640205, Hardcover) Entertainment Weekly 01/11/2013 pg. 89 (EAN 9781451640205, Hardcover) Audio File 04/01/2013 pg. 60 (EAN 9781455815722, Compact Disc) Contributor Bio:  Hunter, Stephen Stephen Hunter's novels have appeared on bestseller lists from The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and The Wall Street Journal, to Publishers Weekly, USA Today, and The Washington Post. His novel Point of Impact was adapted into the recent film Shooter, starring Mark Wahlberg as Bob Lee Swagger. Recently retired as chief film critic for The Washington Post, where he won the Pulitzer Prize for Distinguished Criticism, Hunter has also published two collections of film criticism and a nonfiction work, American Gunfight. He lives in Baltimore, Maryland. Contributor Bio:  Schirner, Buck Schirner's professional career has primarily been on stage as a character actor. He is currently active in the theatre scene in Philadelphia. He also does television and radio commercial work, and likes to play a relaxing round of golf when time permits.