Bill Granger (2)Recensioni

Fairly average spy thriller mainly set in Helsinki. As I love Helsinki myself, the city descriptions were very enjoyable, but apart from that, this appeared to be nothing more than a bad James Bond copy.

Three US agents die in Europe and Deveraux, ex CIA agent is lured back to find out why and who is behind it.

I read 51% of the book before I decided that enough was enough, this book was for me. The funny thing is that when I sat down to write this (very) short review, I just couldn’t figure out the books plot, so I actually had to google the book to find out what the hell it was about. Not a good sign…

Anyway I couldn’t finish the books, it is all me, the book is probably great if the right person reads it, I wasn’t the right person.

Thank you Netgalley for providing me with a free copy for an honest review!

Review also posted on And Now for Something Completely Different and It's a Mad Mad World

Devereaux is no longer a spy. But when he suddenly gets calls from his former handler Hanley his life is about to change. Suddenly he is reactivated and must fight to stay alive.

This spy novel is the first in a series about Devereaux alias November. I thought it would be fun to read the book since book number 7 soon will be in released. The book wasn’t that bad in the beginning, but I never really got into the story. In the end I just felt like “ok” that was it, he/she was the bad guy/girl and I just didn’t care.

I will read one more book since I have requested and been granted book nr 3 in the series. Hopefully the book is better than this one.

Thank you Netgalley for providing me with a free copy for an honest review!

Review also posted on And Now for Something Completely Different and It's a Mad Mad World

Devereaux is no longer a spy. But when he suddenly gets calls from his former handler Hanley his life is about to change. Suddenly he is reactivated and must fight to stay alive.

This spy novel is the first in a series about Devereaux alias November. I thought it would be fun to read the book since book number 7 soon will be in released. The book wasn’t that bad in the beginning, but I never really got into the story. In the end I just felt like “ok” that was it, he/she was the bad guy/girl and I just didn’t care.

I will read one more book since I have requested and been granted book nr 3 in the series. Hopefully the book is better than this one.

Thank you Netgalley for providing me with a free copy for an honest review!

Review also posted on And Now for Something Completely Different and It's a Mad Mad World

I almost quit reading about half way through. I would have to agree with MaraBlaise that the first half is a real snooze. It takes too long to set things up. The second half does pick up, but I'm not sure it's worth wading through the first half. It does have an interesting and prescient plot involving Russian hacks of US computer systems.

Ok, I'm a huge Hemingway fan, so when I saw this at a thrift shop for a quarter, I snagged it. Well, when I got over throwing it across the room because it wasn't remotely about Hemingway, I realized it was actually NOT a bad spy story after all. Rather James Bond-ish in style, except that the hero is definitely NOT a Bond wannabe, he's a tough, not really pretty, badass who's a Vietnam vet. "Hemingway" in this book, was a nom de plume of another agent who wrote a secret CIA manual about terrorists. The November Man is on the hunt to reclaim the stolen book & return it to the CIA or destroy it before those secrets get out. Typical of spy stories, there's a ton of plot twists, blowing shit up, yada yada. If you like spy stories, give it a shot. If you are expecting to be about Papa Hemingway, as I was, you're gonna be disappointed, like I was, & then read it anyway. At least it's entertaining

Devereaux is drawn into the hunt for the titular notebook on a Caribbean island.

I went back and downgraded a [b:Burning the Apostle|1559602|Burning the Apostle (November Man, #13)|Bill Granger|http://www.goodreads.com/assets/nocover/60x80.png|1469231] review , part of Granger’s November Man series because this one is just so much better.

Devereaux, his code name is “November,” wants nothing more than to continue playing the IF game with members of Section R, one of those elusive agencies hiding within the intelligence bureaucracy that is used often to accomplish tasks that border on the illegal (the ethics of such a system we won’t debate here.) He has a nice relationship with Rita, who hates the agency.

The R Section offices were in parts of two Department of Agriculture buildings: The intelligence section had been first funded under subparagraph R of a funding bill for all agriculture. The funds that established R section were vaguely labeled as money for “agricultural crop estimates and international grain reportage,” clumps of words intended to make legislative eyes glaze over.” No doubt a very accurate portrayal of how agencies get hidden and buried within the larger bureaucracy. I just wonder how many of them are there and no one knows what they do nor to whom they might be accountable.

Devereaux is persuaded he must trek off to Alaska in search of Henry McGee, an elusive spy who was supposed to be dead, but now seems to be sending a signal that he is not. A trapper by that name has been found shot in the wilderness. Of course, that wasn’t his real name, so when his prints find their way to Washington, Section R becomes concerned and Devereaux, their senior agent is charged with finding out what’s going on.

Mix in a couple of former Soviet agents being hidden in the Witness Protection Service, a rogue double-agent who wants to leave the business and gains funds to do so by blackmailing a former and current Senator by threatening the oil pipeline in Alaska with total destruction (does he or does he not have a suitcase atomic weapon?) and a very bright Civil Service employee who actually takes her job seriously, and you have all the elements of a very nice espionage novel.

“Espionage is just Trivial Pursuit at a different level.”

Excellent post-Cold War spy novel, one of Granger’s “November Man” series.The operatives in Section R are trying to discover how and why money is being laundered through a bank owned by one of the richest men in the world who happens to be friends with an important Senator who, in turn, is illicit friends with Britta Andrews, a leggy blonde with millions.

Devereaux, one of the operatives, had blackmailed Carroll Claymore, who worked for the bank’s owner, Clair Dodsworth, into supplying the section with intelligence information. In the meantime, Britta has enlisted a terrorist to “make a statement.” Her father had been a radical who had blown himself up while constructing a bomb. Her plan is to set the Apostle nuclear power plant on fire in such a way that the resulting radioactive plume would kill thousands of people thereby ruining the reputation of nuclear power and saving the planet. (The Apostle plant is clearly patterned about the Byron nuclear plant seventeen miles from where I live. It’s described as being sixty some miles west of Chicago and south of Rockford, Illinois. As an aside, Britta’s proposals are not so far-fetched after hearing Derrick Jensen speak. Then again, Jensen reminds me so much of radicals in the sixties; same language, just different target.)

But then the Arabs running the ICC and controlling the bank want to know what Britta plans as they would appear to conflict with their own. Britta has her own ideas.

More like LeCarre than Fleming, the spies lie, the bureaucrats equivocate, lines of responsibility are blurred, the people fail in their personal lives, and the little people just try to survive. It’s a funny world we live in where we celebrate security and do our utmost to be safe but hire ex-cons and drug-addicts for minimum wage to do our due diligence; and then we wonder why things go wrong.

Can’t remember how I ran across Granger but he came highly recommended and as his stories take place in the Chicago area, I ordered a few from the library. He has several series in addition to the November Man, another about a Chicago cop. I’m surprised they haven’t been rereleased as ebooks. They should be. Used copies are going for a lot of money.

I picked up this 1990 book from the for sale shelf of my local library for 50p. It is a bit dated with the cold war still on and IRA still waging war with the UK. However it is a well written thriller with lots of plots and twists. The story is easy to get into and rattles along at a good pace.

The Edgar award winning story of the search for a very public serial killer during a Chicago heat wave. An atmospheric, authentic, sad and funny page-turner. This is the way the "City that Works" really works. Having lived in Chicago all my life, the characters are so real they could be (and maybe were modeled on) my friends and neighbors.