OK, I admit it: I am a huge fan of John Rain and Dox. I like these characters developed by Barry Eisler. In the newest John Rain novel, he brings in Ben Treven, Hort, and Larison from his other two novels. They are hired to stop a governmental plan of staging domestic attacks in order to precipitate the suspension of American civil liberties by the President and his anti-terror team, and the four assasins are not sure whether their kills are promoting chaos or freedom. Hort remains the master manipulator. Rain's attempt to elicit Larison's humanity as Dox did for him was a highlight. ( )

Surprisingly good in the end... Turns out to have more substance than it looks in the beginning. ( )

After a bit of a break, my reading his books and him writing the Rain series, we're both back. This one's not so good; a wildly improbable, and horribly preachy, domestic terrorism/coup/whatthehell story, it still is interesting enough and certainly moves along briskly after the half-way mark. Not really recommended unless you just fall upon it. ( )

I have to admit that this was my first Barry Eisler book. Sure, I've read plenty of his comments about writing, e-books, the rise of the independent authors, his love of internet memes; but this was the first time I've been able to grab one of his books to read.

Before I comment on the book itself, I just wanted to say that this was a library book that I borrowed. Yes this point is significant. With the current turmoil over Amazon becoming a publisher there was a lot of talk about boycotting and limiting access of Amazon published books in bookstores and libraries. Clearly there wasn't much substance to that particular stance, since this Thomas and Mercer published book was right there on the library shelf for me to read.

Did I enjoy this book? Yes. Would I read another of Barry's thrillers? Yes. Then why only three stars? Well, simply put, the book was solid but not spectacular. It kept me entertained, but didn't keep me glued the way 4 and 5 star books do. This was more to do with the second half of the book and what felt like a petering out of tension.

Either way, I look forward to reading some of the earlier books in the Rain series. ( )

This is a very well written book, with a very good plot, excellent character development and a readability factor which altogether results in a book that is difficult to put down. ( )