TRIAL OF THE SEVENTH CARRIER

ZEBRA

Written by Peter Albano

Copyright © 1990 by Peter Albano



In Trial of the Seventh Carrier, written by Peter Albano - the sixth book in the Seventh Carrier series - the seventh Japanese carrier Yonaga and a WWII submarine go up against terrorists.

With Brent Ross serving on the WWII submarine Blackfin, tensions flare between him and the Blackfin's commander, Lieutenant Reginald Williams. It seems almost unamerican that these two should be at odds with each other. It seems to me that Ross and the Japanese should be at odds with each other instead of Ross and Williams, but Ross and the Japanese have grown to respect each other throughout the series. The Libyans and Japanese of course loath each other and the confrontations between these countrymen are pretty graphic.

The one thing that I keep waiting for, but so far has not been shown, is some kind of attempt to circumvent the Chinese killer satellite weapons system that is preventing the use of modern ships and planes and other modern weaponry and communications. This was basically preventing any real computing power and programming for military use. Despite the fact that as of 2013 we civilians are used to lots of computer devices, you would think that back in 1990 there would still be a lot more computer access for use in the military.

Pancho 
All people smile in the same language.
 

The Lion

GRAND CENTRAL PUBLISHING

Written by Nelson DeMille

Copyright © 2010 by Nelson DeMille

In this sequel to The Lion's Game - The Lion, written by Nelson DeMille, has former NYPD homicide detective John Corey of the Anti-Terrorist Task Force being pursued by the wanted Libyan terrorist "The Lion."

As part of the John Corey series, this is a serious thriller, with typical witty asides from John Corey. There are several times I wonder how Corey's FBI Special Agent wife Kate puts up with him. Since terrorist Asad Khalil "The Lion" had escaped without a trace in a previous book, The Lion's Game, Khalil returns several years later to take care of unfinished business - get revenge on Corey and Kate for their interference in his last terrorist killing spree.

Leaving behind a series of bodies, both of civilian and Agents bodies in both Khalil's mission and in Khalil's revenge, Cory is determined to get Khalil - especially as Khalil has made his revenge personal.

It is interesting to see the contrast of the difference between Khalil's Libyan culture background and our American culture background. While you understand Khalil's motivation, even Khalil is extreme as far as his people is concerned.

Pancho 
All people smile in the same language.

PATRIOTS

Ulysses Press

Written by James Wesley, Rawles

Copyright © 1990-2009 by James Wesley, Rawles. Fourth Edition (Expanded) All Rights Reserved.











Cover design: what!design@whatweb.com

Cover photos: istockphoto.com



In Patriots - written by James Wesley, Rawles - America in the near future has an economical collapse and the infrastructure of the country fall. Now a group of survivalists must gather together at an enclave to protect themselves from the gangs of looters.

Most of this book is more of a textbook on survival instead of having an actual story for the book since Rawles has a blog on family preparedness. Actually, most of the dialog between characters were more like an instructional manual of how they did things during their journeys and of gathering their gear instead of any real character development. The story did not really get interesting until the last third of the book as the characters deal with a provisional American government and a provisional President of the United States of America as they go to war. While I can understand that a provisional American government was put in place, I never got any real knowledge of how the original Federal government was disbanded aside from an economic collapse. There were also a couple of characters that I thought would become major characters in the book, but these characters just disappear without any resolution to them.

There is a disclaimer in an IMPORTANT NOTE TO THE READER that the novel is only for entertainment purposes only and not intended as a source of instruction. Although, there were a number of survival skills described that would seem to be quite helpful.

There is a Glossary at the end of the book of survivalist terms, as well as an Index of various survival subjects that you can refer to.

Pancho 
All people smile in the same language.
 

ALEX RIDER - POINT BLANK

PUFFIN BOOKS

Written by Anthony Horowitz

Copyright Anthony Horowitz, 2001

All rights reserved



In Point Blank, the second book in the Alex Rider series by Anthony Horowitz, some billionaires have been mysteriously killed and orphaned Alex Rider is sent by MI6 - the British Secret Intelligence Service - to infiltrate a school in the snow-covered French Alps that is a school for these malcontent children of these high profile industry businessmen in order to find out why they are being killed.

Alex is brought by helicopter to Point Blanc by Mrs. Stellenbosch, the co-director of the Point Blanc Academy for young men. While at the Academy, Alex meets the students at the Academy which includes James - who wants to escape from the Academy. After sneaking out of his room, Alex sees a boy being dragged downstairs and believes it to be James. The next day, Alex sees James - whose attitude towards escaping the Academy have changed. James has become just like all the other robotic students at the Academy.

Alex soon finds out the sinister truth about the Academy - that the Academy is targeting these young men - and signals MI6 for help.

What I did not like was that the head of MI6, Alan Blunt, refuses to have his people go in on the Academy immediately - thus risking Alex's life. But I did like that when a team of SAS - Special Air Service - soldiers is finally sent out to liberate the school, the team is lead by Alex's former SAS trainer Wolf.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

KING KONG

THE MODERN LIBRARY

Written by Edgar Wallace and Merian C. Cooper

Novelization by Delos W. Lovelace

Introduction by Greg Bear
Preface by Mark Cotta Vaz

Introduction copyright 2005 by Greg Bear
Preface copyright 2005 by Mark Cotta Vaz

All rights reserved.



In King Kong - originally written by Edgar Wallace and Merian C. Cooper, with the novelization by Delos W. Lovelace - movie producer Denham is out to make a film with the new 8th Wonder of the World - the great ape, King Kong.

Denham takes a film crew and an innocent leading lady, Ann Darrow, out on a freighter ship in the South Pacific ocean and sails to an exotic tropical island in order to search for a mythical legend. There on the island full of dinosaurs, they run into the natives who kidnap the beautiful actress Ann and have put her up to sacrifice to the native's mysterious monster god - the giant gorilla beast King Kong.

This novelization of the original movie from 1933 gave me the feeling of the movie. The Preface by Mark Cotta Vaz explains how the story of the movie King Kong came about. This is especially important as some people like me might think that King Kong had came from a book first, but this is a completely original story that was created to be produced for a movie - with Cooper saying that he had gotten the idea from a dream that he had of a giant gorilla terrorizing New York. From reading the Preface, this story seems more like a biography about Cooper who is living his life vicariously through the character of Denham - especially with a film crew trying to film an unusual wildlife phenomenom. Greg Bear's introduction of the book gives a modern perspective of the story behind King Kong. The fact that the book is printed by Modern Library Classics shows how much of an impact this fictional story of a beast loving a beauty has had on the American popular culture for the movie story to be even considered to be a classic story.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language. 

Johnny Tremain

LAUREL LEAF BOOKS

Written by Esther Forbes

Copyright 1943 by Esther Forbes Hoskins
Copyright renewed 1971 by Linwood M. Erskine, Jr.
Executor of the Estate of Esther Forbes Hoskins



In Johnny Tremain, written by Esther Forbes, Johnny is a young silversmith apprentist who soon becomes involved with the start of the American Revolutionary War.

I have always wanted to read this book after watching the
Walt Disney Productions movie of Johnny Temain when I was a kid. In the book, Johnny appears to me as younger than what he was portrayed in the movie. Johnny was also more of an arrogant, egotistical kid in the book - at least in the beginning - than he was in the movie. I had difficulty liking Johnny as a result of his being so arrogant, as compared to Johnny being a hero to me in the movie. Johnny also does not have any good relationships with the people around him because of his arrogance. Aside from those things, most of the book was in the movie from what I can recall of the movie, as I have not seen the movie since I was a kid. Although, The Liberty Tree song was written for the movie of which the song was about the American Revolution. I was actually surprised at how much of the American Revolution events that was incorporated into the book that Johnny would be involved in, including Johnny being involved with several of the historical characters. Actually having the fictional characters of Johnny Tremain becoming involved in the American Revolution against the British Army Redcoats representing the British crown made the Revolutionary War come alive for me far more than it ever did for me in my American History classes of the revolutionary war battles as well as the American Minutemen coming alive for me as the Minutemen fought for the American War of Independence.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

ALFRED HITCHCOCK and The Three Investigators in THE MYSTERY OF THE NERVOUS LION

Armada

Text by Nick West
Based on characters created by Robert Arthur

Copyright 1971 by Random House, Inc. All rights reserved.




In The Mystery of the Nervous Lion, written by Nick West, The Three Investigators are being sent by film director Alfred Hitchcock to the theme park - Jungle Land. The owner of Jungle Land, who is Hitchcock's friend, has rented out the park to a movie company - who has trouble with the owner's nervous lion.

Southern California is full of theme parks, some of which have come and gone, so this story of a theme park was rather appropriate for the series. Jungle Land is more like a zoo, rather than a typical theme park with attractions and rides. With only about four people to run Jungle Land, including the animal handler and the animal doctor, it is not surprising to me that Jungle Land was on the verge of bankruptcy and that they had allowed a film crew to film on their Land. I was surprised that Jim - the owner, along with Jim's nephew Mike - had made the trained lion as pretty much of a pet. So, while it was a surprise for Jim and Mike to find out that George the lion is nervous, it was not a surprise to me that the lion was a pretty dangerous animal to be around. Although, there was a good reason why the George the lion was nervous - having Jim and Mike in a sort of denial about George the lion being harmless was very reckless to me.

I liked the fact that the Three Investigators spent much more time at Jupiter's Uncle Titus's "Jones Salvage Yard" than they have spent in the earlier books. The Salvage Yard, after all, is Jupiter's home as well as The Three Investigator's Headquarters. So naturally the Investigators should spend more time in the Salvage Yard. There is more time spent with Uncle Titus and Aunt Matilda as well as time spent with their Bavarian helpers, the brothers Hans and Konrad. As a result, there was an equal amount of time spent between Hans and Konrad as well as spending the time with The Three Investigator's chauffeur Worthington.

There is quite a lot of danger for The Three Investigators involving escaped animals, as well as danger with an auto metal shredder.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

PRIVATE

VISION

Written by James Patterson & Maxine Paetro

Copyright © 2010 by James Patterson



In the first book of a new series Jack Morgan, Private written by James Patterson & Maxine Paetro, has former Marine Jack Morgan running an investigation company called Private. Morgan and his investigation company are investigating an NFL gambling scandal and the serial slayings of schoolgirls. But the case that gets to Morgan - is the murder of his former lover, who was also his best friend's wife.

Considering that Morgan has a team of high-tech investigators in his company, but also that his company is worldwide, it is hard to believe that Morgan's company makes that much money to pay for all of that. Granted Morgan's father had started the company, and had provided the money to both Morgan and his brother in order for them to run their own businesses - but when you consider that Morgan's father had wound up in jail, this made such an inheritance to the brothers confusing. Was the money from Morgan's father legitimate or not? The book was not very clear on the reasons of why Morgan's father went to jail in the first place, nor of how Morgan's father had built up enough money to start such businesses for both of his children. Supposedly Private was started by Morgan's father as well, but I had no idea of that from reading the book.

Considering what kind of cases that were involved in the book, the cases portrayed did not seem as intense to me as they should have been. This is probably because Morgan has a team of qualified, high-tech cyber investigators that was working all of the cases, instead of just Morgan working the cases by himself. With Morgan not working the cases, it lessons the intensity of the story for me that Morgan does not personally experience the chance of failure for not directly working the cases. The cyber investigators were especially important in the book for the investigation dealing with the cyber-related serial killings. As a result of the team of investigators, I felt no sense of desperation or code of honor from Morgan in the solving of these cases. Morgan seemed to me more like he was someone who was just developing his portfolio with his business operations, rather than as someone who was really interested in solving the cases. I cared more for Morgan's Second-in-Command Justine Smith, since Smith was the one who was in the streets determined to catch the serial killer.

Actually, what I liked best about the book and Morgan was of Morgan's guilt when he was in the military and survived a helicopter crash - in which Morgan was forced to leave a man to die inside the helicopter crash. The military aspect of Morgan was much more relatable to me than his dysfunctional relationship with his gambling brother, of which I could never really understand why they became at odds with each other in the first place. Morgan's brother was a real jerk, and I could not believe that the two of them ever had any kind of loving relationship when they were kids.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

DALE BROWN'S Dreamland - RETRIBUTION

HARPER

Written by Dale Brown and Jim DeFelice

Copyright © 2007 by Air Battle Force, Inc.



In Dale Brown's Dreamland - Retribution, written by Dale Brown and Jim DeFelice, the Dreamland team - which is based at a secret military facility in the Nevada desert - are searching for more than two dozen nuclear weapons that were lost when India and Pakistan launched these weapons against each other. Fortunately the Dreamland team were able to neutralize the nuclear weapons with their new systems, but now that war has been prevented, Dreamland must recover the weapons before other authorities and guerrilla fighters recover them - while two of their own have been lost at sea.

As the Dreamland team try to recover the nuclear weapons in the Mid-East, Lt. Colonel Tecumseh "Dog" Bastian searches for his daughter and her husband - who both have bailed out of their plane damaged from air combat, and are injured and marooned on a deserted island. Meanwhile, Air Force Major General Terrill "Earthmover" Samson tries to take over Bastian's command of Dreamland.

While I understand Samson may want command of Dreamland with no apologies, I can not appreciate the fact that Samson has no respect for what Dreamland does - whose personnel are the best of the best. Samson tries to remove everything that makes Dreamland what it is - including the specialized strategic hi-tech programs that Dreamland is developing, as well as removing the personnel in charge of the programs.

The use of the Whiplash UAV's (unmanned aerial vehicle) makes me appreciate more the capabilities of such aircraft. You are seeing the UAV's more and more in the media when dealing with the military or covert organizations. And when you consider that UAV's insures the safety of our pilots, it is a wonder that more of these aircraft are not in operation. Most of the media attention today is focused on manned aircraft, probably due to the high visibility of pilots and the more clandestine activities of UAV's. It is curious that even the remote pilots care about the fate of their remote planes, just as regular pilots care about their planes - even if the remote pilots are not physically flying the UAV planes.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

To Catch A Spy

An Otto Penzler Book





















Written by Stuart M. Kaminsky

Copyright © 2002 by Stuart M. Kaminsky



In Stuart M. Kaminsky's To Catch A Spy,  private investigator to the movie stars Toby Peters takes on a case for actor Cary Grant which involves Nazi sympathizers secretly operating in Hollywood.

After the exciting opening scenes with Toby's client Grant - of which the scenes reminded me of the final scenes from the movie North By NorthWest - I was waiting for the scenes that lead up to that dramatic point of the story at the beginning of the book, since after the opening scenes the book goes back to how Toby got started on this case. Cary Grant is being blackmailed and goes and asks Toby to meet his blackmailer at a park - where the person Toby is supposed to meet gets shot. Now Toby must find the person mentioned in the dying man's words. Soon Toby's friends, inept dentist Shelly Minck, wrestler/poet Jerry Butler, and Swiss little person Gunther Wherthman discover a Nazi link to a University.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

WE WERE SOLDIERS ONCE... AND YOUNG

HARPERTOURCH
An Imprint of  HarperCollinsPublishers

Written by Lt. Gen. Harold G. Moore (Ret.) and Joseph L. Galloway

Copyright © 1992 by Lt. General H.G. Moore and Joseph L. Galloway



In November of 1965, 450 men of the 1st Battalion, 7th Calvary fought at the Ia Drang Valley in Vietnam against 2000 North Vietnamese soldiers in the first major large-unit American engagements of the Vietnam War.

The basis for the movie We Were Soldiers, starring Mel Gibson, this non-fiction book is told from eyewitness accounts by the men - both American and Vietnamese - who fought in that war. Written by the commander of the battalion Lt. Gen. Harold G. Moore (Ret.,) and the reporter on the ground, journalist Joseph L. Galloway, this book is basically about two battles - as a sister battalion of the 1st Battalion was also cut to pieces a few days later in the Ia Drang Valley in the first conventional battles of the Vietnam War with heavy casualties on both sides.

What got to me the most about reading the book was reading the list of names of the people who gave their lives for their country in the beginning of the book - especially when I read the names of the people who were local to me. The experiences of the 'Lost Platoon' were sad for me as I was thinking, "what if that was me?" This battle was also basically the first use of the 1st Calvary Division (Airmobile) - the first use of helicopters as a major aerial combat force in Vietnam. While reading about the helicopters, I kept on thinking about the book Chickenhawk by Robert Mason and of Mason's experiences of being a Huey helicopter pilot. One thing I learned in the book We Were Soldiers Once... and Young, that I did not know about the Vietnam War era, was that in the beginning of the war the Army was not set up to do casualty notification - so in Columbus, Georgia, Western Union used taxi-cab drivers to deliver the casualty telegrams to the soldiers relatives homes. The people in Columbus dreaded seeing the taxi-cabs driving around as a result. I know I would have dreaded seeing them as well. The book never really got into how the cab drivers felt, except for one cab driver getting drunk, but I can imagine that it must have been heart-breaking and tearing the cab drivers up inside as the drivers went out and performed this sad duty that was not originally in their job description.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

STORMBREAKER

speak
An Imprint of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

Written by Anthony Horowitz

Copyright © 2000 by Anthony Horowitz, All rights reserved




In Stormbreaker, written by Anthony Horowitz, the British banker uncle of teenager Alex Rider is killed. Alex soon discovers that his uncle was not just killed in a car accident - but was murdered. His uncle's boss, Alan Blunt, then has Alex brought into "The Firm" and recruits teenaged Alex for something completely unexpected - as being an agent for Britain's Secret Intelligence Service - MI6.

The first of the young adult Alex Rider series, Alex, with his talent as a martial artist, is blackmailed by Blunt into now completing the counter terrorism mission Alex's secret agent uncle was on - finding out why a philanthropist, who is distributing new computers to schools across the country, had his uncle killed.

Of course, Alex was completely in the dark about his uncle's true occupation as an agent and was totally in shock about all of this. Alan Blunt, as the Chief of MI6 Secret Intelligence Service, is ruthless in that he blackmails teenager Alex and Alex's skills as a martial artist into being an agent for MI6, when Alex really is just a kid. Blunt really does not care about Alex as he sees and only uses Alex as a tool to be used for Her Majesty's Government's national security and economic well-being. Making Alex as a tool does not necessariliy gaurentee him to be a good intelligence officer - although he is - but Blunt does not seem to care.  Blunt also does not seem to be aware of, or care of, the political fallout to him and the agency if the news of Blunt using a kid as an agent for MI6 ever gets out to the public. You want Alex to be so good at his mission and confront the man who had killed his uncle - so that at the end of all this adventure, Alex can be justified in telling Blunt off and to go shove it so that Alex can go home and live out his life in peace.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

TEMPLE

St. Martin's Paperbacks


Written by Matthew Reilly


Copyright © 1999 by Matthew Reilly
Excerpt from Area 7 copyright 2002 by Matthew Reilly



In Matthew Reilly's Temple, American university linguist Professor William Race is recruited by the U.S. Army and brought to the jungles of Peru to translate a centuries-old manuscript that will lead to an Incan idol made from a meteorite  - whose extra-terrestrial properties are powerful enough to build a doomsday bomb.

With several competing military factions searching for the idol, including the U.S. Navy, a lot of action happens in this book when the doomsday bomb program is stolen from DARPA, the military's research facility. Race is in dire straights as all of the factions aggressively go after his academic talents. The book changes point of view several times as Race translates the manuscript, with the manuscript translation done in first person. When reading from the manuscript, the point of view of the manuscript/book then is from a monk who had traveled to the land of the Incan Empire and then the manuscript talks of the monk's escape from the Spanish conquistadors as well as his quest with the idol.

The fact that there are legendary large mutant-like pumas guarding the idol may throw some people off, but the pumas creates a natural peril in this story - besides the military factions and the native tribe as Race's antagonists - which I liked.

The excerpt for Matthew Reilly's Area 7, a Shane Schofield novel, shows the assassination of a senator and the man responsible for his assination, thus setting things up for what the book really is about - controlling the President of the United States.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

G.I. JOE - ABOVE & BEYOND

A Del Rey Mass Market Original

Written by Max Allan Collins

Copyright © 2009 by Hasbro Inc.
Copyright © 2009 Paramount Pictures

All Rights Reserved.



In the prequel to the movie G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, the book Above & Beyond deals with the G.I. Joe team - an elite United Nations Special Operations Force - on a parallel mission with Lieutenant Duke Hauser's elite American covert insertion team, in secret support for Hauser's team as both teams search for advanced weapons that are being sold by weapons dealers.

In this book, you get to know a little bit more about the individual Joes, including Cover Girl - who did not last very long in the movie. I actually grew to like Cover Girl in the book and felt rather sad knowing her ultimate fate in the movie G.I. JOE: The Rise of the Cobra. There are two missions, the first mission dealing with the sophisticated weapons that the weapons dealers are dealing with. The final mission is the one that is mentioned in the movie and deals with super soldiers - along with Duke's doctor brother-in-law. This second final mission leads into the movie and the terrorist organization that they will deal with. I felt the pain of Duke, whose pain was a consequence of that last mission. This prequel book is a little more believable to me than what the movie had portrayed.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

UP COUNTRY

WARNER BOOKS EDITION

Written by Nelson DeMille

Copyright © 2002 by Nelson DeMille

Cover design by Jackie Merri Meyer
Cover illustration by Stanislaw Fernandez
Hand lettering by Tony Russo



In Up Country, a sequel to Nelson DeMille's The General's Daughter, Paul Brenner, who resigned from the U.S. Army's Criminal Investigation Division, is called back into service in Washington D.C. by his former commanding officer - who wants Brenner to conduct an investigation into a homicide that occurred 30 years ago during the Vietnam War. Vietnam veteran Brenner reluctantly returns to Vietnam in the middle of the Tet new year celebration - and meets ex patriot Susan Weber, a possible CIA agent. Brenner and Susan then journey through Vietnam searching for the witness to this 30 year-old mystery.

While there is the story of the homicide investigation, most of the book seems like an autobiography of Demille's experience as a U.S. Army lieutenant during the Vietnam War. Brenner revisits his former battle sites and bases in the country as the country celebrates the week-long Tet celebration. Brenner tells Susan of his experiences at these sites to her, the horror of the fighting of the U.S. troops and the Viet Cong, as Brenner searches for a witness who used to be an enemy. You see the contrast of Brenner's and the Americans western influence on Vietnam as a new market, despite the holiday frame of mind of Tet. You also see the conservative Asian Vietnamese culture and the politics as evidenced by the repeated investigated interviews by the Vietnamese cop Colonel Mang against Brenner - who resents the American involvement that resulted from the Cold War military conflict, so Brenner suffers from Mang's resentment. Even if the country prospers from the western tourism of Vietnam, Mang is quite resentful. While the ending of the book was not exactly satisfying to me, the ending does reflect the political attitude of the end of the conflict back in 1975.

Brenner's relationship with Susan is interesting, because you are never really sure if Susan is really interested in Brenner as a lover - or if she is ready to betray him and kill Brenner as part of Susan being a CIA operative. Certainly Brenner is ambivalent to Susan as he is always wondering about Susan's feelings, as well as wondering about his relationship with his girlfriend who is still back in the States.

Paramount Pictures had bought the rights to Up Country with John Travolta reprising his role as Paul Brenner. We will see if the movie will go into production and come out.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER

Written by Ian Fleming

Copyright © 1956 by Glidrose Productions Ltd.

Paperback
Publisher: Berkley (May, 1982)
Language: English

ISBN-0-425-05364-4



In Diamonds are Forever, part of the James Bond series by Ian Fleming, Britain' secret service agent Bond is sent to America to search for diamond smugglers in order to defend the national security and economic well-being of the United Kingdom. Bond once again teams up with his American agent friend and counterpart Felix Leiter and meets the hot, mysterious Miss Tiffany Case as he uses her to go up against the mob.

As Bond tries to infiltrate the mob, it is just a little too unbelievable to me that a stranger from England is able to get into the mob that easily. Granted there was some initial suspicion from the mob, but there was not enough suspicion for me to totally believe that he could get accepted with them even at a low level. It would seem criminals would be very cliquish and paranoid against strangers. There is a little action involved in the book, but not as action-packed as compared to today's media like the James Bond movies. Considering the title Diamonds are Forever, diamonds are hardly mentioned in the book - even if diamonds was the reason Bond was on the case. When you consider the high value of diamonds as a highly traded precious stone commodity, this is a most noticeable lack of use in the book - as diamonds have been the driving violent force behind using slave and child labor, especially in Africa, to fund the blood diamonds by dictators and revolutionary entities. I do not recall any mention of these issues being touched on in the book. It would have been interesting to see if the cliquish criminals had attatched some of the supposed supernatural lore of diamonds to their diamonds when they were dealing with them.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

Wild Fire

Vision
Hachette Book Group USA

Written by Nelson DeMille

Copyright © 2006 by Nelson DeMille



In Wild Fire, part of the John Corey series, Detective John Corey investigates the death of a fellow Anti-Terrorist Task Force agent who was investigating the Custer Hill Club in the middle of the woods - and finds out a horrible Mid-Eastern American plot concerning nuclear weapons just after 9/11.

This is a typical smart ass John Corey thriller - where the running gag in this book is about bears, especially since Cory is a city person. The stakes get higher and higher as John and his FBI agent wife Kate discover more and more about the sinister plot with the nuclear weapons - and America's automatic response to a domestic nuclear strike called "Wild Fire." Wild Fire is based on a rumored actual Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD) retaliation response of the U.S. military's nuclear arsenal concerning a hostile first strike use of weapons of mass destruction against America, the result of which would basically mean the annihilation of both sides if it happens. The plot all originates from a mountain hunting lodge club - a club whose members include high-level members of the U.S. government.

When they first describe the nuclear threat to John and Kate, I kept thinking they would explain something like the wargame scene in the movie Wargames, where all the nuclear missiles from the various nuclear pacts launched at each other. That was a scary scene, just thinking about the implications. Since one of the targets in Wild Fire was Los Angeles, I can imagine how scary it would be like if the Wild Fire scenario was intentionally initiated in my hometown.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

Fail-Safe

THE ECCO PRESS

Written by Eugene Burdick + Harvey Wheeler

Copyright © 1962 by Eugene Burdick and John Harvey Wheeler, Jr.

All rights reserved



In Fail-Safe, during a routine strategic airborne incident deployment from the Strategic Air Command on an unknown airline, one group of American nuclear strike bombers accidentally gets a "go" code from their Fail-Safe box to complete their mission - to bomb Moscow.

I remember watching the 1964 movie Fail-Safe with Henry Fonda, which was based on the book, in junior high school and how suspenseful the movie was - and the awful executive decision the President was forced to make here at home. The movie was so suspenseful that all the students in my class were interested in the movie, which is hard to do to interest a rowdy junior high class. This was still during the height of the Cold War, so the relevance of the movie particulary hit home with us. I am not sure if it was the politics or the hardware that my class liked. I think the guys were interested in the planes and hardware, like I was. Watching a primitive, when compared to today, computerized tracking system as the high-speed, high-altitude planes head deeper into Russia - and the Russians response - was both cool and terrifying at the same time.

All of the above from the movie is in marked contrast to the book, which has the first half of the book dealing with all the politics. The bombers do not really get the orders to head for Moscow until halfway through the book, which I was a scene that I was waiting for. Reading through all the politics was boring when compared to the suspense of the movie. There was one entire chapter on the background of one character, but the character's background had no real bearing on the story except for the character's academic achievements. When I was reading this chapter, I was going - "Get on with the story!" Even the 2000 live-event TV movie Fail-Safe was more suspenseful than the book, of which I believe is mainly due to the quality of the acting and the compact pacing of telling a story in a two hour time-block. The cover of the book that I had read had a sticker on it, Soon to be a CBS-TV Live Movie Event Starring George Clooney.

You can see how trusting all of our military strength to such fail-safe machines like this, especially with such awesome power of the Strategic Air Command, is a precursor to such things as the Terminator movies - like Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines. It is interesting that the term "fail-safe" just really means that if a failure happens, the failure should happen in the safest fashion.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

Flight of the Phoenix

HarperEntertainment
An Imprint of  HarperCollinsPublishers

Written by Elleston Trevor

Copyright © 1964 by Elleston Trevor. All rights reserved.

Search Amazon.com for the flight of the phoenix



In Elleston Tevor's The Flight of the Phoenix, a Skytruck air freighter runs into a sandstorm - and crashes in the Sahara desert,  the largest desert in the world. Now the survivors of the air freighter must struggle to stay alive in one of the hottest places on Earth as they desperately try to build a smaller new airplane from the wreckage of the Skytruck.

The development of the surviving characters are uneven - as I only recall half the characters of whom I could distinguish from the others. The struggle for leadership between the guilt-ridden pilot Towns and the obsessed engineer Stringer, as they construct the new plane to get away from their harsh landscape, is the main focus of the characters - although I was a bit put off by Stringer's inexperience with the real world. When the British soldier Captain Harris insists on traveling through the vast desert to a distant oasis to get some water, it seems almost cruel to me that the captain expects his sergeant to go marching with him into the parched, forbidding dessert. Especially since the Sahara desert gets less than three inches of rain per year. This book has been made into two movies - the 1965 film with James Stewart with a Fairchild C-82 Packet, as well as the 2004 film with Dennis Quaid with a Fairchild C-119 Flying Boxcar. I saw the 2004 film in the theater and the plot point towards the end of the movie was a shocker for me, but it seems to have been played down in the book.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.
Search Amazon.com for the flight of the phoenix

ATTACK OF THE SEVENTH CARRIER

ZEBRA BOOKS

Written by Peter Albano

Copyright © 1989 by Peter Albano



In ATTACK OF THE SEVENTH CARRIER written by Peter Albano, the fifth book of the Seventh Carrier series, the Imperial Japanese aircraft carrier Yonaga - which was originally supposed to be part of the Pearl Harbor attack force in 1941 - must deal with getting combat ready to go against an enemy naval fleet, while Lieutenant Brent Ross is assigned to a WWII submarine.

Because of a Chinese space orbital weapons system, modern weapons and machinery become destroyed if used. So WWII equipment is brought out of mothballs to fight the world's terrorists. As Lt. Ross, the American samurai, falls for a mature woman CIA liaison agent, Ross learns how to operate a WWII submarine to fight alongside Yonaga against a battle fleet. Considering that American submarines sank almost five million tons of shipping during WWII, this submarine is an important part of Yonaga's fleet. The loss of one of the major characters in the series is a shock and is sure to affect Ross in future novels.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.