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Fire Lover

A True Story

Audiobook
0 of 1 copy available
Wait time: About 2 weeks
0 of 1 copy available
Wait time: About 2 weeks

Fire Lover is the incredible true story of John Orr who, as a young boy growing up in Los Angeles, watched with awe as firefighters scrambled to put out blazes with a seeming disregard for their own lives. Wanting to emulate his heroes, he later became a fireman with the Glendale Fire Department. An eccentric loner who made few friends, Orr moonlighted as a security guard, eventually becoming a fire captain and one of Southern California's most renowned serial-arson investigators.

Though he successfully helped apprehend a string of petty arsonists, there was one serial criminal Orr couldn't track down—one who was responsible for the deaths of four people. These perfectly executed blazes were set by a fire lover who used the same simple yet devastating device time after time. He went undiscovered until one day when he left a fingerprint, one clue investigators could match. When they did, they were stunned to discover that the print belonged to none other than John Orr.

Using interviews, case records, and hundreds of thousands of pages of court transcriptions, Joseph Wambaugh writes a chilling, sophisticated, and suspenseful story that is destined to rank beside his previous bestsellers.

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    • Publisher's Weekly

      April 22, 2002
      Returning to print after a six-year hiatus, former LAPD detective sergeant and bestselling author Wambaugh (The Onion Field, etc.) focuses on firefighters rather than his usual police beat. It's a surprising switch, but Wambaugh's regular readers will not be disappointed, since sparks fly throughout this potent probe into the life of arson investigator John Leonard Orr. Fascinated by fires in his L.A. childhood, Orr learned fire fighting in the air force. An eccentric loner with few friends and a womanizer with a string of failed marriages, he was rejected by the LAPD and LAFD. In 1974 he joined the Glendale Fire Department, where his gun-toting, crime-crusading capers earned him the label "cop wanna-be" from both police and firemen. Rising in the ranks, Orr became well-known as an arson sleuth. He had a sixth sense for tracking pyros, but there was one serial arsonist, responsible for the deaths of four, who remained elusive. In 1990, during the worst fire in Glendale's history, some noted that Orr's behavior "seemed very peculiar." That same year, Orr was appointed fire captain and began writing a "fact-based novel" about a serial arsonist who turns out to be a firefighter—and in it Orr revealed certain facts about the unsolved arson case that he couldn't have known through his work. Was Orr the serial arsonist? Wambaugh recreates these events for a suspenseful, adrenaline-rush account of what one profiler dubbed "probably the most prolific American arsonist" of the 20th century. (May 14)Forecast:Wambaugh's name should sell this title, aided by the scheduling of an HBO movie about Orr (starring Ray Liotta) to run only a few weeks after the publication of the book.

    • AudioFile Magazine
      All John Leonard Orr wanted to be was a policeman, but when he was turned down, he became a fireman in Glendale, California. In a perfect ironic twist, he was also one of the most prolific arsonists the United States has ever seen. Ken Howard narrates this sordid tale with a straightforward, tough, and aggressive voice. His diction is somewhat sloppy, but it works because this is true hard-boiled crime. His pacing is keen, and he keeps us interested through some technical court transcripts. The fact that this is a real event makes it that much more engrossing. R.I.G. (c) AudioFile 2003, Portland, Maine

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  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

Languages

  • English

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