Tom Young (1)

I have never read a Tom Young novel before, but I can promise you that I will be reading anything he writes from now on! The best part about reading this book is that even though it is apparently the third in a series with the same characters, I did not feel lost. The author does a wonderful job of providing enough relevant facts from his other books that I felt like I was able to bond with the characters in this book. While getting to know the main characters like Lt. Colonel Michel Parson show more and Sgt Major Sophia Gold was a treat, the other characters such as Capt. Rashid and Sgt Reyes were equally important. I don't know if the latter two play a part in earlier novels but I sure do hope they come back in other novels!

In The Renegades, a Taliban splinter group is out to make a name for itself and its methods are so extreme that the Taliban seems tame in comparison. They pose a danger not only to the American forces in Afghanistan and their Afghani allies, but the Taliban identifies them as enemies of Islam and humanity! So Parson, Gold, and all the other characters here find themselves trying to track down and eliminate this group. But can they do so without the aid of the Taliban? And if not, how can they possibly convince the Taliban to help?

Well this is what you will need to read the book for...to find out!

The story is of course exciting in itself. The mission guaranteed to bring action and excitement. But I'll be honest, it was the character development I like the best. There are some action novels where the action is what it's all about. One could care less who dies. Well in this book that is not the case. I felt like bonded with all the characters. I understood why they did what they did. When a very minor character finds himself blackmailed and made to turn on his American allies, I feel bad for him. His actions are despicable, but I could understand what motivated him.

Overall, this book is simply excellent. Go out and read it! show less

This kind of book usually ain't my cup of meat, but I'm trying to read outside my confort zone now and then. In a nutshell:

Everything that can go wrong does go horribly wrong in this incredibly fast-paced thriller about a military transport plane with a terrorist’s bomb aboard. This is the sequel to The Mullah’s Storm, and continues Major Michael Parson and Sergeant Major Sophia Gold’s heroic attempts to bring peace and stability to the Afghan region.

And it was pretty good!

When you read about Afghanistan it’s always heart-breaking, but when you get down and dirty with the extremists, it’s more than that. A group calling themselves The Black Crescent is out-Talibaning the Taliban in that they are kidnapping young boys from desolate villages and turning them into walking bombs. Into this step Lt Col Michael Parsons and Sgt Major Sophia Gold – he to advise Afghan pilots and she to interpret.
Of course it doesn’t stop there, Parsons and Gold always go far show more past their jurisdictions into emotional involvement with their advisees and the family of children taken. Sophia’s Pashto calms many confrontations and get them much needed intel on the Black Crescent and their hiding places.
This is my second Tom Young book and, as usual, I was caught up in the emergency of the situation, of the children being used as bombs and of the care that Parsons and Gold have for one another. I’m sure there is much more there than was written. An exact telling of put together bases, impromptu plans and human lives at stake will keep you up nights reading and nights after worrying about the children, their parents and their world.
If you like this tale, go back and pick up Young’s two other books: The Mullah’s Storm and Silent Enemy. I guarantee you won’t be sorry! show less

When a novel starts with a bomb exploding in the Afghan National Police training center, you expect either a bad book which relies on shocking events or a good one that can use the shock and devastation to tell a good story. Fortunately, this one is from the second type.

Just when you believe that everything bad is behind everyone and people will get saved with the evacuation planes comes the second blow - the whole initial explosion was just a ruse to get everyone on planes bound to other show more places... and the planes are rigged with explosives. On top of all we meet Major Michael Parson and Sergeant Major Sophia Gold, a few years older but not necessarily wiser (Note to anyone in their world - if you see these two on the same plane, you better get out of their way -- they most likely will crash or worse...). Once the people on the ground realize what is going on, they redirect the flight to an island in the middle of nowhere where it can make as little damage as possible. And the race with time is on.

The premise is not all that original but what makes it sound different from anything similar is the author - an ex military flight engineer. He knows about planes more than anyone else. And he knows how to give all the technical details without making them sound boring or forced in the story. Using two different narrators (Gold and Parson) help as well - he knows all that is to know about planes; she does not. Somehow the author manages to make both voices believable.

If there is a problem with the book, it is mostly in the substories and secondary characters - sometimes it feels like the technical part of the story is taking the lead and leaving anything out of it in shadows. But then the narrators are on the board of that flight and any narration from the name of the protagonists will be centered on them and what they deem important.

A note of warning though - if you plan to read Mullah's Storm and you don't like knowing what happens in the book, read it before you even start this one. The author reveals pretty much anything that happened there - mainly because this was needed to understand some parts of the book. But if you do not mind knowing what will happen or not plan on reading the first book, you can follow this one with no issues -- everything needed is in the story itself, without being too repetitive for the people that read the first one.

4 stars out of 5 and I am waiting to see what the author will write next. show less