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Library | Item Barcode | Call Number | Material Type | Item Category 1 | Status |
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Searching... | 30000010363198 | PR6056.O699 C63 2010 | Open Access Book | 1:CREATIVE_G | Searching... |
Searching... | 33000000008012 | PR6056.O699 C63 2010 | Open Access Book | 1:CREATIVE_G | Searching... |
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Summary
Summary
AN UNWINNABLE WAR
Cocaine is worth billions of dollars a year to the drug cartels who spread their evil seed across Western society. It causes misery, poverty and death. And slowly its power is spreading...
A MAN ON A MISSION
Ex-CIA special ops, Paul Devereux, intellectual, dedicated and utterly ruthless, is given what seems like an impossible task: Stop the drug barons, whatever it costs. At his disposal, anything he wants - men, resources, money. He must assemble a team equal to the lawless men who control this deadly trade.
AN UNTHINKABLE SOLUTION
Up to now the drug cartels have had it their way. Up to now, the forces of law and order have played by the rules. That is about to change. Those rules no longer apply... and a dirty war is about to get a whole lot dirtier...
Author Notes
Frederick Forsyth was born in Ashford, England on August 25, 1938. At age seventeen, he decided he was ready to start experiencing life for himself, so he left school and traveled to Spain. While there he briefly attended the University of Granada before returning to England and joining the Royal Air Force. He served with the RAF from 1956 to 1958, earning his wings when he was just nineteen years old.
He left the RAF to become a reporter for the Eastern Daily Press, Reuters News Agency, and the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). While with the BBC, he was sent to Nigeria to cover an uprising in the Biafra region. As he learned more about the conflict, he became sympathetic to the rebel cause. He was pulled from Nigeria and reassigned to London when he reported this viewpoint. Furious, he resigned and returned to Nigeria as a freelance reporter, eventually writing The Biafra Story and later, Emeka, a biography of the rebel leader Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu.
Upon his return to England in 1970, Forsyth began writing fiction. His first novel, The Day of the Jackal, won an Edgar Allan Poe award from the Mystery Writers of America. His other works include The Odessa File, The Dogs of War, The Fourth Protocol, Devil's Alternative, The Negotiator, The Deceiver, The Fist of God, Icon, The Veteran, Avenger, The Afghan, The Cobra and The Fox.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews 3
Publisher's Weekly Review
Veteran Forsyth (The Day of the Jackal) shows once again he's a master of the political thriller by taking a simple but completely original idea and turning it into a compelling story. The unnamed Obama-like U.S. president, disgusted by the horrors wrought by illegal drug trafficking, decides to bring the entire weight and resources of the federal government against the international cocaine trade. He first declares drug traders and their cartels to be terrorists, subjecting them to new and extensive legal procedures, then he brings in ex-CIA director Paul Devereaux to head the team that will implement the effort. Devereaux, known as the Cobra from his operations days, is old school-smart, ruthless, unrelenting, and bestowed by the president with free rein to call in any arm of the government. Forsyth lays out how it would all work, and readers will follow eagerly along, always thinking, yes, why don't they do this in real life? The answer to that question lies at the heart of this forceful, suspenseful, intelligent novel. (Aug.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Booklist Review
Forsyth invented it: the political thriller with whiplash-inducing change of locales, plot twists, and new villains, all set to the metronome of an impending assassination, or bomb, or terrorist threat, ticking down to zero hour. Since The Day of the Jackal in 1971, Forsyth has written 15 thrillers and spawned countless imitators. But he still has the surest hand when it comes to tripwire plotting. A real, nonrhetorical war on drugs has its start in a kitchen pantry in the White House (Forsyth doesn't say it directly, but readers will know this is the Obama White House) when an elderly waitress suddenly leaves her post, sobbing, and is followed out by the First Lady. The waitress' grandson has died from a cocaine overdose; the First Lady tells the president, and we're off to the races. The president orders the director of the DEA to produce a document on cocaine (a handy plot device that gives Forsyth a chance to explain how cocaine is processed and distributed). The president then decides that the only way to deal with this drug is to give extraordinary powers to one man to do whatever is necessary to stop the evil. Enter former CIA agent Paul Devereaux ( The Cobra ), last seen in The Afghan (2006). Matters get a little comic bookish at this point, with one man fighting evil (with the help of a shadow agency), but the tightly wrapped story keeps us going. Forsyth's canny depiction of the cocaine industry's workings is alone worth the ride.--Fletcher, Connie Copyright 2010 Booklist
Library Journal Review
After the almost symbolic death of a black youth from a drug overdose, an American President who is clearly Barack Obama decides to wage war on the Colombian drug cartels. Retired senior CIA operative Paul Devereaux (code named Cobra because he strikes ruthlessly) and former army operative Cal Dexter (The Afghan) are brought back to lead the effort. Given carte blanche to destroy the drug industry, Cobra builds up an elite strike force and, augmented by superb intelligence and technology, launches devastating attacks. The equally ruthless drug lords strike back violently. As the bodies and betrayals pile up, the President has second thoughts about the firestorm he's unleashed. Verdict Like almost all Forsyth's novels, beginning with The Day of the Jackal, his latest is a tightly written book that is half thriller and half procedural. With numerous intriguing twists, turns, and betrayals, it is only slightly marred by an improbable ending. Still, highly recommended for Forsyth and thriller fans.-Robert Conroy, Warren, MI (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
