Introduction

Stephen Hunter is a Pulitzer-prize winning newspaperman who recently retired from reviewing movies for the Washington Post. In his spare time over the past few decades, he has written some of the greatest and most under-sung novels in American literature.

It was these novels that first drew my attention to Hunter more than ten years ago, but when I searched the Internet to learn what I could about him, there wasn't much there. And what was there was scattered hither and yon, through dozens of different web locations.

I was just learning to create websites back then, and Hunter seemed like an interesting topic. So I put this site together (in considerably more primitive form than you see). Eventually, the attention I garnered included an occasional note from Stephen Hunter himself, and we finally met over dinner on one of his west coast stops for the Havana book tour in 2003.

At the end of the decade, Hunter's star continues rising. His latest novel, I, Sniper, has garnered the legendary "grand slam" of fiction - rave, pre-release reviews from all four major reviewers in America (Publisher's Weekly, Booklist, Kirkus and Library Journal). My personal favorite of his novels, Point of Impact, was made into the movie Shooter, grossing over $150-million for its producers. In the ten years between creating Bob Lee Swagger and the character's debut on the silver screen, Hunter wrote a series of awesome novels featuring Bob Lee's father, Earl, fighting in World War Two and beyond. Since Shooter, Hunter has brought back Bob Lee in "47th Samurai" and "Night of Thunder" - with the third "new" Bob Lee Swagger novel, "I, Sniper" due to hit bookshelves at the end of 2009.

Dead Zero: Hunter's latest book, scheduled for release at the end of 2010

From New York Times bestselling author and Pulitzer Prize winner Stephen Hunter comes a thriller that plunges deep into the world of high-tech national security, the hearts and minds of those who kill for duty, and the latest mission for veteran sniper Bob Lee Swagger—who may have finally met the only man who can outshoot him.

Who killed Whiskey 2-2?

And why won’t it stay dead?

A marine sniper team on a mission in tribal territories on the Afghan-Pakistan border, Whiskey 2-2 is ambushed by professionals using the latest high tech shooting gear. Badly wounded, the team’s sole survivor, Gunnery Sergeant Ray Cruz, aka The Cruise Missile, is determined to finish his job. He almost succeeds until a mystery blast terminates his enterprise, leaving a 30-foot crater where a building used to be—and where Sergeant Cruz was meant to be hiding.

Months pass. Ray’s target, an Afghan warlord named Ibrahim Zarzi, sometimes called “The Beheader,” becomes an American asset in the region and beyond, beloved of State, the Administration and the Agency. He arrives in Washington for consecration as Our Man in Kabul. But so does a mysterious radio transmission, in last year’s code. It’s from Whiskey 2-2.

Mission will be completed. Confidence is high.

Is Ray Cruz back? Has he gone rogue, is he insane, or just insanely angry? Will he succeed, though his antagonists now include the CIA, the FBI, and the same crew of bad boys that nearly killed him in Zabol province? Not to mention Bob Lee Swagger and a beautiful CIA Agent named Susan Okada who gives Swagger more than just a patriotic reason to take the case.

Swagger, the legendary hero of seven of Hunter’s novels from Point of Impact to last year’s best-selling I, Sniper, is recruited by the FBI to stop the Cruise Missile from reaching his target. The problem is that the more Swagger learns about what happened in Zabol, the more he questions the U.S. government’s support of Zarzi and the more he identifies with Cruz as hunter instead of prey.

With its hallmark accuracy on modern killing technologies, Dead Zero features an older, more contemplative Swagger, but never lets up on the razor-sharp dialogue, vivid characterizations, extraordinary action scenes, and dazzling prose that define Hunter’s landmark series. And with this installment, the stunning revelations—both political and private—will leave readers begging for more long after the last bullet finds its way home.

What you'll find on this website

The News section has instances of Hunter or his books in recent media.

Hunter Highlights offers some of Hunter's writings you may not have seen before.

You can suggest a Frequently Asked Question through the email form at the lower left corner of any page.

Interviews gathers some interviews with Hunter from around the web.

The section titled "Comments on Hunter's Novels" is based on Wordpress, and allows unlimited conversation between us fans. In order to leave a message, you will have to register first. This allows me to easily squash spam before it happens. (Thanks to you frequent visitors who stoically discussed Hunter's books through the erectile disfunction and porn ads on my earlier Postnuke-based bulletin board).

Enjoy, and don't be shy with feedback, especially if you have some ideas for improvement.