Rules of Deception
by Christopher Reich
|
List Price: Our Price: $0.22 You Save: $24.73 (99%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $0.01 (click here) Category: Book See more book details and other editions |
|---|
Book Reviews of Rules of Deception
Book Review: His characters --- both primary and secondary --- are every bit as compelling and memorable as the storyline.
Summary: 5 Stars
RULES OF DECEPTION, the latest offering from award-winning author Christopher Reich, makes demands. Reich, whose bibliography consists of some of the most intelligent contemporary thrillers in print, has a penchant for what has been referred to elsewhere as "complex" plots. Fair enough; his work is challenging, in part because his stories are set very deeply in this world. As is thoroughly demonstrated in his new book, he has a good grasp of current events and the ways in which seemingly unrelated events are very closely tied together. Such things do not lend themselves to headline news, no matter how one tries to jam them to make them fit. Reich's work is painted on a much broader canvas, demanding singular attention to detail and to what has gone before. Fortunately, such effort on the part of the reader is rewarded one hundredfold.
Jonathan Ransom is the heart of RULES OF DECEPTION, a character who is both unique and an everyman, an expert in his field who suddenly becomes a fish out of water on a very hostile and inhospitable shore. Jonathan is a physician who eschews the fortune a medical practice could bring him, choosing instead to devote his knowledge and talents to Doctors Without Borders. As the book begins, he is taking a rare holiday with his nurse-wife, Emma, climbing the Swiss Alps and contemplating his career. Everything changes for Jonathan within the space of a few heartbeats when a blizzard sets in and Emma is lost to a hidden crevasse.
But he barely has time to grieve before his belief in his life and work is irrevocably altered. Not even 24 hours after the terrible mountainside accident, an envelope for Emma is delivered to their hotel room. All it contains is two baggage claim tickets, which are to be reclaimed at a remote baggage station. Puzzled and intrigued, Jonathan journeys to the site only to be attacked almost immediately by two men. Thanks to some luck and lightning fast reflexes acquired from working and living in dangerous places, he leaves one assailant dead and the other mortally wounded. However, Jonathan is horrified when he discovers that his attackers were Swiss policemen. Their deaths bring the Swiss authorities into play.
Meanwhile, two apparently unrelated deaths of "persons of interest" to Swiss counterespionage agents bring Marcus von Daniken, a quietly efficient and extremely competent investigator, into play. As Marcus's investigation slowly begins to dovetail into the deaths of the two policemen, and thus into Jonathan's world, he finds himself pursued by two Swiss law enforcement agencies and a shadowy, calculating assassin.
An unknown group of individuals are slowly but inexorably putting together the pieces of a plot to create an incident of international terrorism that will lead straight back to the Iranian government, in the hope of beginning a conflagration that will bring on a cataclysmic event. Jonathan slowly discovers, to his horror, that Emma had been leading a secretive double life and was an integral key in a plot that, if carried out, would result in the deaths of innocents. Whose side was Emma on? Was she trying to bring the plot to fruition, or prevent it? Grieving and angered by turns, even as he is pursued from all sides, Jonathan engages in an investigation on the run, aided only by an old family friend and headed toward what may well be the biggest shock of all.
Christopher Reich is a sure-footed guide through the labyrinthine plotting of RULES OF DECEPTION, and his characters --- both primary and secondary --- are every bit as compelling and memorable as the storyline, which reads as if it was ripped from tomorrow's headlines. Marcus von Daniken, in fact, almost steals the book away from the main characters, functioning in his own way as a lower key Samuel Gerard to Jonathan's Richard Kimble. And then there is Zvi Hirsch, an upper-level official in the Israeli government. He's not only one of the most intriguing characters in the book, but also one who you'll hope has a real-world model.
--- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub
Book Review: Rules Becomes A Series
Summary: 4 Stars
Reich is one of those authors whom I feel I discovered all on my own. More than ten years ago, when he was making the rounds plugging his debut book, Numbered Account, I saw him on one of the morning shows and was immediately interested in him. He had an investment banking background and had lived for quite awhile in Switzerland where he got the inspiration for that first book he wrote. After Numbered Account, there came The Runner....a book that proved he was no flash in the pan. Here was the real deal -- two great books in a row and I discovered him!! I have followed Reich's career since then always buying his books the first day they hit the bookstores. I may not always read them that first day but I certainly do buy them.
I have to say that not all of Reich's books have been as good as those first two but he's still a huge cut above most of the other mystery/thriller authors out there. I'm particularly drawn to his books that have a financial background simply because that seems to be Reich's expertise. And then came The Art of Deception, a book that caught me right up in its web of intrigue but, unfortunately, got too convoluted for me in the end.
Many of the other reviewers here have already spelled out the story of part-time mountain climber and full-time surgeon Dr. Jonathan Ransom. He's affiliated with the Doctors Without Borders organization which becomes the perfect occupation for the backdrop of this book as these doctors travel all over the world to perform these surgeries . Ransom finds himself in the middle of a life and death struggle when he finds out his wife has been leading a mysterious double life. This book is a real cat and mouse chase and, as I look back at all of Reich's other books, they can also be described the same way.
When I finish reading a book, I usually like to do some research on the author and I found out some interesting tidbits when I researched both Reich and The Rules of Deception. Apparently Reich loves the character of Jonathan Ransom....so much so that this was the first book in a series featuring him as the main character. He said in a recent interview that "he didn't start out with the idea of it being a series but realized halfway through it that Ransom was the hero he'd always wanted to write. He said he came alive to him in a way that others hadn't." I can't tell you how surprised I was to read this because I just never felt the connection with this character while reading the book. When I was finished, I never felt the need to go back and visit with him once again although now I find I will be. I just hope that in the next book, Reich goes back and develops Ransom a little bit more so that his readers will feel the same way about him as Reich does.
The second very interesting thing I found out was that the inspiration for the book came from none other than General Tommy Franks. Apparently, the two were working on a TV show together as consultants and Franks told Reich some stories about members of the Joint Special Operations Command. But Franks was very clear on one point about these "operators." They never spoke about their missions and nothing could ever make them do so. So Reich began to wonder what would happen if you were married to one of these operators.
So after meeting Franks, the stage was set for this book. I can see now that the ending does leave itself open to some sequels and it will be interesting to see how Reich pulls this off. As a loyal follower of this author, I selfishly wish this series had a banking background to it as opposed to a medical one but that won't keep me from reading books by one of my favorite authors. I just have one question for Reich....."Why couldn't the series have centered around one of my favorite characters...Nick Neumann from Numbered Account?" Is that too much to ask?
Book Review: RICK "SHAQ" GOLDSTEIN SAYS: "AN INTERNATIONAL THRILLER THAT COMBINES ALL OF TODAY'S HEADLINES AND FEARS!"
Summary: 5 Stars
"A guard patrolling the custodial road caught the flash of yellow lying in the dirt. He approached cautiously... it was not like any butterfly he had seen before. First of all, it was larger. Its wings were rigid, with jagged bits of a paper-thin metal protruding from the silken skin. The fuzzy thorax was split in two and connected by a green wire. Mystified, he picked it up and examined it. Like all those who worked at the facility, he was first and foremost an engineer, and only reluctantly a soldier. What he saw left him shaken. Inside the thorax was an aluminum-cased battery no bigger than a grain of rice, and attached to it, a microwave transmitter. Using his thumbnail, he sheared away the antennae's skin to reveal a cluster of fiber-optic cables, thin as human hair."
"His hand shook as he radioed his superiors." "THEY HAVE FOUND US."
*** And so this pot-boiling international cauldron of intrigue begins! ***
What I am about to describe to you at a velocity faster than "ELECTRIFIED-HUMAN-TWITCH-MUSCLE-SPEED" will "NOT" give away any of the myriad of climactic-multi-level mysteries and conundrum's awaiting the potential reader's of this fast-paced and intelligent thriller.
Dr. Jonathan Ransom, a surgeon for Doctors Without Borders, is hiking on a treacherous mountain with his wife Emma, an administrative nurse in the same organization, as a storm starts to approach. Emma falls into an unseen crevasse and dies. One day later, before Jonathan's true mourning can even begin... events quickly unfold that makes Jonathan wonder if he really even knew who his wife was. From unclaimed packages... to missing explosives... to CIA agents capturing terrorists and transporting them illegally throw Swiss airspace... to a professional deranged assassin known as the "Ghost"... to double agents being murdered... to dirty cops... to terrorist suspects flown by America to the Middle East to be boiled in TWO-HUNDRED-DEGREE-WATER in a vat, till their skin comes off, in order to save hundreds if not thousands of innocent lives... and what questions of ethics would arise if the International Atomic Energy Agency knew that Iran had FIFTY-THOUSAND-centrifuges instead of FIVE-HUNDRED... if Iran had radioactive mineral's enriched to NINETY-SIX-PERCENT instead of THIRTY-PERCENT... and what if they had enough enriched uranium-235 to make FOUR AND MAYBE FIVE ATOMIC BOMBS?
The action never stops as the plots and schemes involve law enforcement from around the globe. There are as many fake passports in this novel as there are fake breasts in Hollywood. Although the reader is transported from country to country, a predominance of time is spent in Switzerland, where death is in the air, despite the fact that Switzerland as a country, recorded a total of sixty-seven homicides the previous year. Less than the American city of San Diego, which had one-seventh the population of Switzerland."
Anyone who says this book doesn't keep you on the edge of your seat... has lost their mind... as well as their seat! Oh yea... we also have "POISON DART FROGS!"
Book Review: Quick Intense Read
Summary: 4 Stars
I enjoyed reading this book and read it fairly quickly. However. I decided to give it four stars instead of three because it kept me going and entertained. Here are some of my observations:
1. The book reads like a Dan Brown or Ludlum novel. Very short chapters, moving from one key player to another and back again. We see things happening simultaneously from three or four different perspectives. However, there are some surprises thrown in and some long pauses between some of the characters that didn't quite work timing wise. The boogeyman is always there ready to jump out and kill him and yet sometimes, he keeps his distance and we forget about him.
2. Like in a Ludlum novel, the main character, Dr. Jonathan Ransom, is constantly confronted with shocking and crazy things that plunge him deeper and deeper into a maze that seems like he will never find his way out. Can you imagine being in love with a wife who is actually leading a totally provocative second life?
3. So the plot thickens, the world is about ready to experience world war three, while Jonathan is dodging bullets, gets lucky over and over again and escapes death and being arrested by the Swiss police, all while having just lost his wife in a skiing accident. A little too much Hollywood here. And yet, like Hollywood, it's fun. That said, I would enjoy it even more if he'd read a little LeCarre or Len Deighton and incorporate more plot plausibility, a little subtlety, a little more real spy stuff and a little less harrowing and exaggerated story lines. Not that the story lines themselves are bad. But they're too quickly put together and too immediate and I felt, too unbelievable, which makes the story not quite as gripping as it could have been.
All and all, it's worth the read, and like "Da Vinci Code," moves along quickly and in short readable chapters with characters you like and care about. It's a great airport novel but with a little work, could have been even better.
Book Review: Too Far-Fetched and Complex
Summary: 3 Stars
Reich's books have all been believable and logical spending more time on character development than on complex plots; however Rules of Deception gets bogged down in complexity and complicated connections.
The story involves competing United States clandestine counter-terrorism groups from the Dept. of Defense and the CIA. In the unlikely plot, they are both trying to frame Iran in different scenarios involving terrorism and nuclear weapons. One of these rogue, secret groups is trying to ignite WWIII by framing Iran in an attack. This US group is willing to kill hundreds of innocents to bring about its leaders perverted idea of Armageddon.
In the midst of the above scenario that ranges across Europe, is Dr. Ransom and well-intentioned doctor. His wife apparently dies in a mountain accident and he learns that she was involved in a double life as a spy.
The plot really goes off the deep edge when we learn that the master criminal is not the usual suspect of an Islamic Jihadist or terrorist state. No, it is an American Major General. The General seems like a genuine evangelical Christian who has changed his life since a near-death experience brought him to the light of Jesus. However, instead of inspiring him to lead a life of charity, his Christianity has somehow inspired him to kill millions of innocent people in starting a world war that he imagines will usher the return of Christ. I think Riech got his religions confused here as this is not typical of any Christians who otherwise lead lives according to Scripture for the most part. This character is unbelievable and non-sensical. It makes me wonder if Reich wanted to avoid offending muslims so he chose to offend Christians. The result is an undermining effect in the plot.
There are some other mysteries in the novel but to reveal them would give away too much of the plot.
Unfortunately, this is not up to the standard of Reich's previous books. I hope he can rebound with the next one.