Larry Bond's Red Dragon Rising: Shadows of War
by Jim DeFelice, Larry Bond
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Book Summary Information
Author: Jim DeFelice, Larry BondEdition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2009-11-10
ISBN: 0765321378
Number of pages: 416
Publisher: Forge Books
Book Reviews of Larry Bond's Red Dragon Rising: Shadows of War
Book Review: Compelling
Summary: 5 Stars
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
This is my first encounter with Larry Bond since Red Storm Rising (1986). I've waited a long time for another book like that one. Red Dragon Rising is almost it. But not quite.
One problem is with length. I no longer have my copy of Clancy's book but it seems to me it was in excess of 700 pages. Larry Bond's thriller (in its "Advance Uncorrected Proof") form about 400 pages. That's not to say it's a bad book. It's not. But it's not enough of a good book. I think Larry Bond could have done so much more with the story. At times, I felt like I was reading an outline - something that he meant to return to later to fill in with the details.
The concept is compelling. Bond is not the first author to look at a future with a dominant China. And it's made all the more compelling by the fact that it takes place only a few years from now (2014). It's easy from where we sit to follow the dots to where Bond begins his story.
The characters are a mixed lot. Bond devotes more time to some than to others. This is obviously a necessity in any story, but I'm not always clear who is meant to be the main character. The protagonist here seems to be the scientist, Josh McArthur, rather than Zeus Murphy, the former special forces captain. This is not what I had expected. It was Zeus I thought would be the guy to carry the story. Unfortunately, Josh isn't always the most likable guy and I'm not certain that Bond successfully pulled off his attempt to portray a drastic change in Josh's perspective. I don't want to give the story away but the motivation for this change of heart wasn't clear to me. It seemed a bit of extra drama added for effect and not really necessary or believable.
That brings up another unfavorable comparison with Tom Clancy. Clancy could pluck a character out of the air, even somebody he's going to kill off in a couple of paragraphs, and make them instantly compelling. You almost felt like you knew them. Bond can't quite pull that trick off. His characters are compelling but not to the degree Clancy's are. It's harder to get to know them.
I had expected the story to be a cat and mouse game between Jing Yo, the Chinese Commando, and Zeus Murphy, the special forces veteran. Zeus was under-utilized, in my opinion; he didn't get enough to do. I was left wanting to see more of him and ending up disappointed. I hope this will change in the next three books of the series.
Another thing I missed, and maybe this will be forthcoming as well, is the set-piece battles Tom Clancy excels at. I lost interest in Tom Clancy's books when he switched to special ops as his focus and I was hoping, since this story is compared to Red Storm Rising, that we would see some big battles here. We don't. It's small unit stuff again. To compare this single volume to Red Storm Rising is not a fair or completely honest comparison. Perhaps it will be less misleading when the other books in the series are completed.
Finally, I felt the ending was a bit rushed. I was disappointed not so much by the outcome but by what tasted more like an author's attempt to hurry up and finish a story. It didn't seem to play out at the same pace as the rest of the story.
Those are my complaints. But on the plus-side, the story is compelling, the characters are interesting (if not always fully fleshed out or utilized), the dialogue is realistic-seeming, and for the most part, I can follow character motivations. The story moves along briskly and it was a difficult book to put down. Given its length, I could have easily finished it the first day, but I wanted to savor it. If you're looking for a rousing good yarn and don't feel the need for another Red Storm Rising, this book is highly recommended. It's enough to make me look into more books by Larry Bond, and that's an argument in its favor as well. As it is, I will definitely look forward to the next three books in the series. I'm connected enough to the story and to the characters to care about what happens to them, and I can't say that of every book I pick up.
Summary of Larry Bond's Red Dragon Rising: Shadows of War
Building off the World War III premise Larry Bond helped Tom Clancy to establish, Red Storm Rising, this new series looks at the world under an omnipresent Chinese superpower. When rapid climate change leads to mass riots in China, a new Communist premier seeks to relieve pressure by marching on traditional Chinese enemies in Southeast Asia. Desperately coping with its own problems, the US wants to avoid nuclear war at all costs - but ultimately must fight to preserve world peace.
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