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An explosive narrative about a long time married couple that experiences a rupture in their marriage lasting 25 years, then the agonizing starts when they finally get together again.

Catherine and Simon have been married for enough time to have three children and one more that didn’t make it past his first few months. They have the appearance of a very happily married couple looking forward to the rest of their lives sharing both good and bad times. Suddenly, out of the blue, Simon disappears with no trace. Searches are launched for him, police bulletins are posted and Catherine is positive that something bad has happened.

Time passes,twenty five years go by, and suddenly out of the blue Simon appears at the door of the house that they had shared and where Catherine still lives. The story of where he has been and why he left is presented in the most brilliant fashion that I have had the pleasure of reading in a long time.

The narrative of the 25 years apart is told in turn by each of them and in a manner that grabs the reader’s interest and keeps it. The manner that each has grown apart from the other is well delineated and assures that the actions and thoughts of the two become clear to the reader. An understanding of how each has acted and what has taken place in their lives is very clear in Marrs’s hands. To complete our understanding of what has motivated the two, the action swings effortlessly back and forth in time at the beginning and then at the twenty five year point.

An extremely well done novel; definitely an all-nighter in every sense of the word.

9/17 Paul Lane

WHEN YOU DISAPPEARED by John Marrs. Thomas & Mercer; Reprint edition (September 7, 2017).  ISBN 978-1611097511. 348p.

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Like your action fast and furious? Like it even more when it is authored by a veteran of action packed combat in real conflict zones. The setting of this novel is in the near future when the African continent has collapsed collectively into a near failed state loosely supervised by the U. N. We meet Slade Crawford, a veteran of nearly 20 years of front line combat, who has been falsely accused of terrorism and is fleeing to Africa to escape his captors. Slade has contracted to lead a group of settlers from the United States looking to make a new life in Africa.

The group lands in Cape Town and begins a journey to the site they intend to settle on which is to the north of South Africa with Slade in military command. The trip is filled with danger and the attacks of a group looking to prevent colonization that has already massacred other colonists looking to settle in Africa. Crawford finds a liking for the goals of the group and also attracts a pretty teenager; a girl half his age that appears to flirt with him. Slade was divorced by his wife and also lost a son just prior to being arrested for terrorism. The double whammy puts him on a path of not caring about anything but the goal of getting his settlers to their destination.

The final section of the novel puts Slade under the orders of the mysterious American Colonel Gary Kraven. The colonel feels free to issue orders to Crawford without telling him what the real situation is that Kraven is following militarily.  Slade ends up going to Nairobi in Kenya under orders from the colonel but also to rescue the pretty teenager that has been following him and was captured by the group involved in preventing African colonization. Slade is now placed in a situation of asking Col. Kraven to help him with the rescue at the price of agreeing to work for him on a full-time basis.

After spending several nights up reading Lt Col(his actual rank) Mangan’s book the reader can take a break and catch their breath while impatiently awaiting the next adventure of Slade Crawford.  A definite keeper and one to follow.

9/17 Paul Lane

INTO A DARK FRONTIER by John Mangan. Oceanview Publishing; Sew edition (September 5, 2017).  ISBN 978-1608092611. 323p.

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A Delta Force Novel, Book 5

This is the latest novel featuring Kolt Rayner and his Delta Force squadron. It features the constant action typical of the series. Kolt is in Greece to aid in defending the American president when the unthinkable happens.  A sniper’s bullet through his left eye kills the Greek Prime Minister. The shot itself serves to identify a foe that Raynor has faced previously. Rasim Miric is the deadly sniper whose trademark is the shot through the eyes of his victim. Miric has a personal grudge against Kolt due to the loss of one of Miric’s eyes in action against him during a previous engagement in Europe.

Raynor is up against the mystery of why Miric did not shoot the American president instead of the Greek Prime Minister. What are Miric’s aims in later traveling to the United States? Why has he singled out Kolt’s squadron for attack when it appears that he is hunting the president? Answers are sought through well-described action by Dalton Fury who served as Delta Force commander at Tora Bora and during the search for Osama Bin Laden.

The information contained in a forward to the book gives us the sad news that Dalton Fury passed away from pancreatic cancer and did not live to see this book published.  Certainly, the literary world has lost a great talent, but Fury’s legacy lives on in his novels as well as his real life deeds.

9/17 Paul Lane

EXECUTE AUTHORITY by Dalton Fury. St. Martin’s Press (September 5, 2017).  ISBN 978-1250120489. 304p.

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