A dangerous enemy, Those willing to fight them.

books:


	• Pandora's Legion: Harold Coyle's Strategic Solutions, Inc. Harold Coyle, Barrett Tillman Forge Books, 2008 - 384 pages average customer review:based on 7 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Intelligent writing; realistic story

I haven't read Coyle before, but I've read several of Tillman's aviation books. His trademark is meticulous research to get the technical stuff right. There is no nonsense about silencers and safeties on revolvers, no foolishness about medical procedures. If Tillman writes that this is the way a Hind helicopter works, then that's how it works. If he says this is how Marburg disease is spread, you can trust him. As a former drum corps player, I can verify that he even got that little part right! Admirable attention to detail. The male characters seem like action heroes, but in fact, the guys in this business really are action heroes. I, too, wish the female protagonist had been merely good at her job; it was not necessary for her to be a hot babe. (For example, was the Derringer character handsome or ugly? We don't know, or need to, because it doesn't matter to the story.) OTOH, there is no ridiculous Penthouse letters-type sex "to help sell the book." (Tom Clancy's gratuitous sex scenes are so embarrassingly awkward, you have to wonder if he's ever been on a second date!) The plot is plausible and clever. The dialogue (usually) rings realistic. One thing I really appreciate is that luck plays a big part in the plot, as it does in real combat. Sometimes the good guys lose and the bad guys win. That helps sustain the suspense. Right up until the end of the book, you still think there is a possibility that the good guys might lose. (It's a book -- the good guys are going to win, right? But... Better keep reading!) I presume Coyle's job was developing the story line. Whatever role each of the authors played, the collaboration works. This book is a breath of fresh air for the genre -- actual intelligent story-telling, instead of just brainless shoot-em-up drivel. Bravo!

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Strangely flat

This tale of bioterrorism and cloak and dagger conflict begins well enough, and establishes the scene and the dangers competently enough, but then falls on a couple of logical inconsistencies. The terrorist network is just too competent to be believable, and there is no reason to use SSI operatives once the action leaves Pakistan.

The mercenary company SSI is hired to investigate and kick in doors in Pakistan to find the terrorists during a period of tension between the US and Pakistan governments. A sensible premise, yet the interaction between SSI and the Pakistan military is smoother than I would believe possible during an outright love-fest between our two countries.

The world-wide terrorist network is so competent, and so universally supported by muslims everywhere, that it can instantly locate an imam in any city willing to knowingly hire hit men or give a bioterrorist a ride to his target in his personal mercedes. This gives jihadis too much credit and at the same time insults every muslim in this country. Providing hospitality to travelers is one thing, but I just don't buy the willing participation the enemy got from Americans in this book.

Then, after the action headed back to the US, I didn't understand why the problem of tracking the bioweapon didn't move from SSI to the full force of the US government. Why sweep anything under a rug at that point? Scream the facts to the ends of the Earth and get the willing cooperation of every government the bioweapons passed through. Marburg would kill their populations as readily as Americans, so why not give them the information they'd need to defend themselves?

The book just doesn't ring true to me.

I did like the military take on recent US politics, though. Tailhook really was a disgrace. I'll give it an extra star just for that.

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A story with several messages

There is more to this story than a thriller. But, before getting into this, I commend the authors for accuracy. Spreading biological agents into a Western population is difficult. Pandemics only occur when environmental conditions are right. Most bio-agents have a very short life once released into the atmosphere. Anthrax is the exception to this rule. I especially enjoyed the story because it is factual. The real bio-agent threat is crop diseases: wheat and rice rust. Hoof and mouth disease for cattle is next.

There are several subtle messages buried in the story. Our self induced vulnerability--no profiling--in order to be politically correct is one. Another is our insane fear of offending Muslims. Today, just as portrayed in the story, the U.S. can't send troops into the tribal regions of Pakistan to hunt down and kill the Taliban and al-Qaeda personnel.

In the story, the government hides all information pertaining to the Marburg attack. Instead of releasing all of the gory details and scaring the pants off our complacent citizens, the government covers up the facts to maintain the notion that we are safe from attack. Unfortunately, this is probably what would really happen. As the author's say in their Author's Note, "The fact that no overt act of terrorism has occurred since 9-11 must be attributed at lease in part to a great deal of good luck. Of course, that situation could change tomorrow morning. And some morning, it will" In this they are correct. I am afraid we will not come to our senses until we suffer an attack many times worse than 9-11.

Strategic Solutions, Inc., is a fictional Professional Military Corporation, hired by the government to do what the CIA and military should be doing, but can't because of our obsession with political correctness. Unpleasant things have to be done when at war, who does them only matters from a perception point of view. The story does a splendid job of pointing this out.

Lee Boyland, author of the first two books of the Clash-of-Civilization trilogy, the story of the next terrible attack: The Rings of Allah and Behold, an Ashen Horse.

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A dangerous enemy, Those willing to fight them.

An enemy so evil they are willing to infect their own people with a deadly virus and send them out as weapons against the infidel. How does a nation faced with dwindling resources, a lack of political will and concensous as to the right thing to do fight such an enemy?
In steps the a Professional Military Contractor, Mike Derringer and the staff of Stratigic Solutions, Inc. See how Derringer's company of experienced men and woman, soldiers of fortune all, move in the nether world of the war on terrorism to meet and stop a threat that is beyond politics, or social correctness. Able and willing to go where armies, and government can't, SSI moves to protect a great nation from it's tied hands. Fact or fiction? Read Coyle and Tillman's work, then you decide.

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reviews: page 1, 2

In this explosive new series from New York Times bestseller Harold Coyle and noted military author Barrett Tillman, a new type of war is being fought by private paramilitary companies at the beck and call of the highest bidder. With the military and intelligence agencies spread thin, the US is constantly calling upon the services of these organizations--and Strategic Solutions, Inc. is among the best.

Members of Al-Qaida have set in place a vicious biological attack. Men and women infected with the highly communicable and deadly Marburg virus have been sent to major cities and sensitive locations throughout the world in hopes of creating a deadly, global epidemic.

The dedicated men and women of SSI, led by former Rear Admiral Michael Derringer, are consummate professionals, nearly all ex-police or military, and are the among the best in the world at what they do. But the mastermind behind the living bio-weapons, Dr. Saeed Sharif, is more deadly than anyone could have possibly imagined. Spread throughout the globe and thwarting attacks on their home facilities, the staff at SSI soon find themselves engaged in a frontline game of ground warfare. And to make matters worse, two infected Marburg carriers are heading straight for the United States. Using every resource it has, SSI launches an all-out search for the walking plague carriers before thousands more become infected and die.

Posing a frightening scenario that could become all too real in the near future, and filled with the details of the military world that have made Coyle?s books bestsellers, Pandora?s Legion hits the front lines of the new war against terrorism in this engrossing, high-stakes novel.

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