The Blue Nowhere : A Novel

His code name is Phate -- a sadistic computer hacker who infiltrates people's computers, invades their lives, and with chilling precision lures them to their deaths. To stop him, the authorities free imprisoned former hacker Wyatt Gillette to aid the investigation. Teamed with old-school homicide detective Frank Bishop, Gillette must combine their disparate talents to catch a brilliant and merciless killer. Amazon.com Review In this 21st century version of the "Gunfight at the O.K. Corral," two computer wizards engage in the kind of high-tech combat that only a hacker could love. Wyatt Gillette, a cybergenius who's never used his phenomenal talent for evil, is sitting in a California jail doing time for a few harmless computer capers when he gets a temporary reprieve--a chance to help the Computer Crimes Unit of the state police nail a cracker (a criminally inclined hacker) called Phate who's using his ingenious program, Trapdoor, to lure innocent victims to their death by infiltrating their computers. Gillette and Phate were once the kings of cyberspace--the Blue Nowhere of the title--but Phate has gone way past the mischievous electronic pranks they once pulled and crossed over to the dark side. While Trapdoor can hack its way into any computer, it's Phate's skill at "social engineering" as well as his remarkable coding ability that makes him such a menace to society. As Wyatt explains to the policeman who springs him from prison so that he can find and stop Phate before he kills again, "It means conning somebody, pretending you're someone you're not. Hackers do it to get access to data bases and phone lines and pass codes. The more facts about somebody you can feed back to them, the more they believe you and the more they'll do what you want them to." Bestselling author Jeffery Deaver ( The Empty Chair , The Devil's Teardrop ) ratchets up the suspense one line of code at a time; his terrific pacing drives the narrative to a thrilling and explosive conclusion. This thriller is bound to induce paranoia in anyone who still believes he can hide his deepest secrets from anyone with the means, motive, and modem to ferret them out. --Jane Adams From Publishers Weekly How do you write a truly gripping thriller about people staring into computer screens? Many have tried, none have succeeded until now. Leave it to Deaver, the most clever plotter on the planet, to do it by simply applying the same rules of suspense to onscreen action as to offscreen. Much of the action in this novel about the hunt for an outlaw hacker turned homicidal maniac does takes place in the real world, but much else plays out in cyberspace as a team of California homicide and computer crime cops chase the infamous "wizard" hacker known as Phate. The odds run against the cops. With his skills, Phate can not only change identities at will (a knack known as "social engineering" in hacking parlance) but can manipulate all computerized records about himself. The cops have a wizard of their own, however: a former online companion of Phate's, a hacker doing time for having allegedly cracked the Department of Defense's encryption program. He's Wyatt Gillette, coveting Pop-Tarts (the hacker's meal of choice) and computers, but also the wife he lost when he went to prison and it's his tortured personality that gives this novel its heart as Wyatt is sprung from prison, but only for as long as it takes to track down Phate. The mad hacker, meanwhile, no longer able to discern between the virtual and the real, has adapted a notorious online role-playing game to the world of flesh and blood, with innocent humans as his prey. As he twists suspense and tension to gigahertz levels, Deaver springs an astonishing number of surprises on the reader: Who is Phate's accomplice? What are Wyatt's real motives? Who is the traitor among the cops? His real triumph, though, is to make the hacker world come alive in all its midnight, reality-cracking intensity. This novel is, in hacker lingo, "totally moby" the most exciting, and most vivid, fiction yet about the neverland hackers call "the blue nowhere." Agent, Sterling Lord Literistic. Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc. Mystery,Thriller,Horror,Science Fiction,Adventure,Adult Jeffery Deaver, New York Times bestselling author of The Skin Collector and The Bone Collector featuring popular forensic detective Lincoln Rhyme, delivers a masterful thriller about a psychotic computer hacker/killer packed with stunning and fact-based technical details and signature Deaver plot twists. People in Silicon Valley are dying. A mysterious, psychotic, and brilliant computer hacker, code-named Phate, is infiltrating their computer, invading their lives, and?with the perfect line, the perfect, personal detail?luring them to their deaths. Desperate, the head of the Computer Crimes Division frees Wyatt Gillette, imprisoned on his own hacking charge, to aid the investigation. Gillette has wrangled with Phate before and is glad to have his chance for revenge. But when the head of the CCD, and the man who hired him, is murdered, Wyatt must report to Frank Bristol, a grizzled homicide detective who favors old-fashioned sleuthing and forensic evidence to track killers. Together, Wyatt and Bristol make an unlikely team but with the same villain in their crosshairs, they'll have to learn to get over the generational, and technological, gaps. Filled with accurate technical details, a "high-tension wired" ( People ) mystery, and shocking surprises, The Blue Nowhere will keep you guessing the outcome to the very last page Jeffery Deaver, bestselling author of The Bone Collector and The Devil's Teardrop , delivers a masterful thriller about a psychotic computer hacker/killer. Set in Silicon Valley, full of stunning—and fact-based—technical details, The Blue Nowhere is Deaver for the 21st Century. His code name is Phate—a sadistic computer hacker who infiltrates people's computers, invades their lives, and with chilling precision lures them to their deaths. To stop him, the authorities free imprisoned former hacker Wyatt Gillette to aid the investigation. Teamed with old-school homicide detective Frank Bishop, Gillette must combine their disparate talents to catch a brilliant and merciless killer. People in Silicon Valley are dying, at the hands of a psychotic and brilliant computer hacker, code name Phate. He infiltrates their computer, invades their lives, and then - with the perfect line, the perfect personal detail, lures them to their death