Brilliant. How do you disband a secret agency whilst guaranteeing no information escapes? Kill them all. Would have made an awesome graphic novel, as pictured in my mind.

I particularly like the one employee who takes on the challenge with the idea that this is the interview for her promotion. ( )

Fun twist on typical "office worker gone psycho" satire. Also featured some great packaging.

This is a one-note book and that one note is violence.

Part of the problem I had with it is that the book in no way matches the cover. I love the black humor of the cover -- "Ever want to kill your boss? Well guess what, the feeling is mutual." -- but that sense of humor doesn't ever show up in the book. There were occasional flashes, but they were between characters peripheral to the main plot and even so they weren't enough to deliver on the cover's promise. I was expecting something much more clever than what I got.

Make no mistake, Swierczynski's writing is tight. I've got no issue with his ability to put together sentences and paragraphs. My problem is with his ability to put together characters. None of these characters are appealing. None of them make you feel any great emotion. By page 50 or so, I would have been perfectly happy if the whole building had exploded. By page 100, I wanted to go in and set the bombs myself. ( )

I hate to write this kind of review b/c it's so unhelpful.

I absolutely could not get into this book. I tried and gave up at chapter 3 or so. I tried skipping to the end, I couldn't even read that.

I couldn't find myself caring one whit about anyone in the book, and leaving the book in the car for lunch hour or even in the bathroom at home still couldn't get me to pick it up.

My review, put guiltily up so late b/c I am an Early Reviewer of this book, is that the marketing (it came in an interoffice memo folder splattered with fake blood) was far, far more clever and enthralling than anything IN the book. ( )

Brutal. Violent. Relentless. Fun. This could be easily be a four-word review, as these particular words go a long way in preparing you for Bill Swierczynski third novel, out on the heels of The Blonde. Severance Package does a wonderful job of combining corporate office politics and the deadly world of nothing-is-as-it-seems espionage, raising the question of exactly which profession is more ruthless, cut throat, and soullessly ambitious. One would be tempting to describe it as a cross between The Office and Three Days of the Condor, but that would barely be doing it justice.

Bill Swierczynski’s writing style has one major asset that many authors tend to overlook these days: brevity. His descriptions are colorful and informative, yet they aren’t weighed down by their own poetic license. Characters and locations are set up and knocked down as quickly and efficiently as dominoes, without ever leaving the reader confused or unsatisfied.

Even the story itself, which takes place in the time frame of a few hours, is tight and compact, with all of the action and suspense layered delicately from beginning to end. Swierczynski’s storytelling style is as quick and hard hitting as a lead sap to the temple.

The comic book reminiscent illustrations scattered throughout the book are interesting and fun, even though some might find them a little distracting. Of course, considering that Swierczynski authored the Cable series for Marvel Comics, and is currently helming a six issue run of The Punisher in Garth Ennis’ absence, the presence of the silhouette artwork is understandable.

If you like your novels short, sweet, and chock full of balls-to-the-wall action, you should definitely not pass this one up. Just don’t forget to punch in. ( )

On his latest outing, Swierczynski plays in the same universe as The Blonde, but with less effective results. The plot is as thin as a Hollywood elevator pitch, and the execution is so fast that there isn't much time to get to know the characters (not to mention that the main male character is a one-note wallflower who is superfluous to the action, and the three female leads are nearly interchangeable in their background and motivation). And there's a couple of ludicrous situations that strain credibility. It feels like Swierzynski reached a little too far on this one, and there just isn't enough to hold it up. ( )

I really tried to like this book. It was my first Early Reviewer book, and I was SO excited! But I just could not get into it. The characterizations seemed thin, and I flat out didn't get the ending. What plot there was seemed to be designed to create the maximum amount of violence. I love a good shoot-'em-up but this one did not click for me. ( )

The book is fast-paced, heavy on internal dialogue, and switches POV as frequently as a chain-smoker exchanges burnt-down nubs for fresh sticks.

The plot concept – the boss is really into espionage, it’s time to close shop, and apparently offing the entire staff is easier than settling unemployment claims – is fun, in a Hollywood not even kinda close to the real world way, but the book jumps around so much that it’s hard to keep a bead on just who, if anyone, the reader should care about in this outrageous going-out-of-business scenario.

Fortunately, Swierczynski writes brisk, frequently witty prose that glides by, and the book thus disappears as swiftly as a box of office donuts, consumed and forgotten by cubicle drones who might, for a moment only, regret the empty calories before getting on with the rest of the day. ( )

If you are a Robert Ludlum fan you may find this book interesting. However, I am not. The graphics sprinkled throughout the book of the “hit list” gave most of the plot away as I thumbed through it before I began to read it. Cold blooded killers, government ordered executions, and undeveloped characters really aren’t my cup of tea (or should I have said glass of mimosa?). The author’s choice of a Stephen King-like ending left no room for redemption. The reference to Bruce Willis was a bit too obvious as this book's plot is loosely based on the "Die Hard" movie. I won't be seeking more from this author. ( )

This is one of those thrillers where the idea is just a little bit better than the execution. A CIA branch office located in a tall building is being shut down. Unfortunately for the employees, they are also being shut down – them boss has locked them inside the office and has been ordered to make sure no one leaves the place alive. But before he can execute his orders, he is incapacitated, and all hell breaks loose.

I don't want to reveal too much of the plot, because that's where most of the good stuff is. Suffice to say that after 50 pages I expected Severance Package to turn into just another Die Hard derivative, but it surprised me the more I read – in particular I thought the setting and the dynamic between the characters were fresh and engaging.

The way the story unfolds is absorbing but the author has a way of letting humour get in the way of a straightforward telling of the story. Or maybe it's just that the humour didn't work for me. Everything else did: the action sequences are good, his characters are interesting, and the setting was cleverly set up to make these things fit together nicely.

A worthwhile addition to the thriller genre. I will be tracking down the author’s other books. ( )

I mostly enjoyed this book, but it does read more like a screenplay than a novel - not enough description or backstory. Also, like a B horror movie, characters you like, and would prefer to have around, die. If an author is going to go into B-movie, slasher type deaths, then they should go for it full on, the lack of descriptiveness by the author in this case makes it feel as though he chickened out, or expects it to be on film at some point rendering a graphic description unnecessary. Overall, the book is not bad, readers with short attention spans will find it sufficient, I, however, would have preferred an additional 100-150 pages to flesh out the characters and situations a little more. ( )

You say a video of your birth was posted on You Tube? You say your youth was flush with Reality TV and video games? You say your attention span is shorter than a gnat's nose? Well then, this is a book for you, kid. ( )

“Severance Package” by Duane Swierczynski is a very attractive book at first glance. The cover shows what looks like an animated cell of an attractive brunet with a gun in hand and her eyes closed against the apparent blood splatter caused by the shot. This is what initially attracted me to the book; I was thinking that it may have a similar feel to Transmetropolitan / Spider Jerusalem comic books. Adding to my excitement was a statement on the back cover that states, “Over a dozen full page illustrations throughout.” As near as I can tell, this is an extremely misleading statement. I hope that it is just the ARC that the “illustrations” are simply hand written lists of names with blood apparently splattered on the page (ink on paper). With the awesome cover art, I was definitely disappointed by the illustrations inside.
As for the book itself, I enjoyed it for the most part. The story is more or less about a secret government office that is being “shut down.” Instead of laying everybody off, everyone must die. The story really starts moving when the office boss, David, announces during a Saturday meeting that everyone should use the offered poison to kill themselves and save him the trouble of killing everyone. One employee, Molly, stops David and then proceeds to start killing everyone as part of an audition, or job interview, for the above mentioned secret government organizations. The action is both thrilling and inventive. I found myself at the edge of my seat during some of the action sequences and laughing at the inventive cruelness of some of the characters (think Marv in “Sin City”). Unfortunately, I did not care about any of the characters enough to truly love this book. I found myself rooting for Molly / Ania / Girlfriend throughout most of the book. The action mostly focused on her and she believed that performing these murders was the only way to save her mother and get her dream man. Even towards the end when Molly is shown as an inhuman killing machine, she is still the only character I felt an emotional connection to. It wasn’t till the last page that I became convinced that Molly was supposed to be the Freddy Cougar or Jason of the book.
Duane Swierczynski establishes a suspenseful situation full of well imagined action sequences. His characters move woodenly through their parts with out much motivation (beyond self-preservation) and with out growing. It was an enjoyable book to pass time on the bus to work (though the tag line “Ever want to kill your boss? Well guess what, the feeling is mutual.” made me a little self conscious), though the characters never truly engaged me. ( )

The key employees of a financial services company are called into work on a Saturday and are told by their boss that they actually work for a secret anti-terrorism agency, which some of the employees know and some did not. Their division is being shut down so they all have to die in order to preserve the secrecy of the agency. The boss expects them to all commit suicide, but the employees are not willing to do that so violence erupts. It turns out that one of them knew about the situation in advance and is trying to gain a promotion within the agency by killing all of the other in creative fashions while other people in the agency watch from cameras within the building.

This is basically a mindless action movie in written form, which ends up being less entertaining than actually watching a movie of it would be. The events of the book take place in a shorter time span than it takes to read the book, so it often seems like the story is moving in slow motion. The plot is ludicrous and mostly pointless as there not any answers to the questions it raises. The background story of the agency is just there to provide an excuse for all these people to try to kill each other, and to provide some filler pages from the viewpoints of higher-up people in the agency. There is no suspense in the book, since the book does not actually provide a reason to care about the fate of any of the characters. For this type of entertainment, just watching an action movie will provide more thrills than reading this book. ( )

I don't go into thrillers expecting literary-caliber prose. I don't look for nuanced, abstract explorations of a character's mental state or deeply symbolic set pieces. But I don't think it's too much to ask for solid, workmanlike prose that clearly and simply conveys what's happening at all times.

I love thrillers, and I wanted to love Severance Package, but too much of it just flops. All its flaws could have been forgiven -- even the gigantic plot holes -- if only it had nailed the kind of visceral action scenes that typify the greatest of the genre. Instead, what we get is an overly stylized blur of wildly shifting internal narration interspersed with the occasional flash of confused imagery. Great action prose doesn't mess around -- it's quick and direct, pared down to its razor-thin essence to hit the reader's mind hard (see No Country for Old Men). This has almost none.

Things seem to happen both too quickly and too slowly at the same time. It jumps straight into the action, neglecting almost entirely the kind of character development that would allow us to differentiate between the nerd and the secret agent, but the different storylines are broken up into a staccato rhythm and mixed haphazardly. One interesting plot sometimes leaves for dozens of pages, at which point it's lost any momentum it might have generated (the tracheotomy scene, in particular, could have been the highlight of the book if it hadn't been sliced up and stretched throughout the narrative).

It's hard to hate a book this earnestly ridiculous, but Severance Package doesn't offer much to love, either. ( )

This is a fast paced book. I read it in about a week. There were some parts that were just short of being overly graphic. If someone likes violence and torture, this is the one for you. I'm not sure of the complete plot as there were a lot of open ends that were left as to what the organization was other than it is the red-headed step child. the only thing I really had a beef with was the bracelet of one of the characters. It was like Batman's utility belt because she kept pulling things out of it. I was thinking that it was if anything 1/2 inch wide and with all teh stuff she had, it seemed like it was more 2 to 3 inches wide. ( )

Like reading a Bruce Willis movie, and takes about as much time. Hyped-up action, one-dimensional characters, and nowhere near enough plot. We meet our characters in little opening vingettes, then it's just a countdown to see who will die next. It was amusing for the two hours it took to read, but I'm glad it didn't take longer than that. ( )

Severance Package is pretty much pure violence. There's no plot or point to the story other then killing from every characters possible. Although the fight scenes (and just about every other scene as well) are not very engaging, possibly because such violence doesn't translate to paper as well as it does on the big screen. One of the reviews on the back of the book states that it has "close-quarters Bourne-style mayhem," but it's not anywhere near the level of the Bourne trilogy. It is also very predictable, especially the ending, and few of it's twists are at all surprising. Overall, if you like violent stories and are looking for something easy to read when you're bored, this book will be fine for that. It's not horrible, it's just not that good. ( )

Severance Package is a book that starts fast and ends faster. This generally works for an action movie - not so well as a book. The premise is good but the execution lacking. The biggest twist in the book occurs about twenty pages in but from there is fairly standard action fare. If you're simply looking for a few hours of escapism give it a try but if you're looking for an indepth plot, clear inner character workings, or a book you'd love to read again and again . . . Pass. ( )

http://books.kenficara.com/2008/03/se... ( )