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1 of 1 found the following review helpful:
 Better title: Ultimate Biological Warfare Dec 05, 2008
By William Polm
This is a military/espionage/medical thriller but could also be categorized as science fiction/fantasy. The characters are well drawn. The plot meticulous. And the author's research rather amazing and certainly thorough. The story's pace is relentless, and I found in reading it that the suspense was constant. I was even tempted to skim paragraphs to find out what was going to happen next. Also, I feel that this book is not only an enjoyable read but worth the reading, as well, for the bio-warfare issues it dramatizes.
It is, however, the relentless action that bothered me some, because it is tiring.
The author socks into the story so many cliff-hangers, that the reader frequently doesn't have a chance to catch his breath. It's like a soap opera written for men!
In good dramatic writing and also fiction writing, there are scenes and sequels. Simply put, scenes are where the action occurs, and scenes advance the plot line, move the story forward. Sequels are where a character reflects on what has occurred and makes plans for where to go next. Sequels not only provide the reader with some respite from the high-strung drama of the action scenes with their ever-present danger, but sequels are where a lot of the depth of a story is developed and explored. The story is not just in the action but in the meaning to be derived from the action.
The pattern in this novel is too often action scene ending in cliff hanger, followed by another action scene and its cliff hanger, and so on. Suspense is no doubt effectively achieved, but I cannot help but feel that there has been a sacrifice of potential depth.
One further point. The author's injection of the Intelligent Design verses Evolution debate into the story seemed a bit contrived. But more than this, the cover of this book has "intelligent Design or Darwin's Evolution?" on it, implying that the book deals directly with this issue. And on the back cover, a reviewer writes concerning that debate that this novel "offers a unique answer to the most controversial argument of our time." What? "A unique answer?" Hardly. More like speculative fantasy based on ancient myths, with evolution, etc., thrown into the mix. If fact, I am reminded of some of the key plot elements of the movie Stargate (original movie, not necessarily the TV series). Actually, in addition to weaving in elements of ancient myths, the author does mention some debate points stemming from the evolution-design controversy but hardly deals with the issues substantively.
Nevertheless, overall, a good read, as a fantasy. It certainly held my interest throughout. Recommended for that--but certainly not as a credible answer to the "Intelligent Design verses Evolution" debate.
3 of 4 found the following review helpful:
 Potentially Interesting Subject that Fails for Poor Writing. Dec 06, 2008
By S. A. ROBBINS
"shirley_rw"
When I got 1/3 of the way into the book, I had already reduced it to 3 stars, 2/3 of the way it was down to 2 and finishing the book, I settled on 1 star.
This book fails for a lot of reasons.
1) The most interesting part of the book is not revealed until the end and only given sparse treatment. Had it been revealed at the beginning and with significant detail, it would have explained the plot and made the book a lot more interesting. The author tries to make the book a cliffhanger with a twist but fails miserably.
2) A significant part of the book deals with inane details of some of the characters and with some of their background. Yet the details do nothing to create strong characters, instead they are annoying and after a couple of chapters I skipped over them.
3) The military characters are ridiculous. If they were created from the author's experiences then hopefully they are unique. Certainly they are far from any that I have encountered or ever read about.
4) Some of the main characters keep coming up with ludicrous sayings. And then switch to a different personality. Difficult to create a true character image.
5) I also did not like the way the story jumped around. Granted it needed to but the problem was that it seemed erratic and was jumping inside chapters. Quite a few times I had to check to make sure I didn't miss a page.
6) The worst part is the ending. Totally ridiculous and not believable. It's not the premise that is but the way the ending plays out. The characters and their actions completely lack any possibility of realism.
Overall one of the worst books I've read in a long time. And yet it could have been unique and interesting. I wonder what the author did during the 5 years he supposedly spent researching this book.
2 of 3 found the following review helpful:
More nonsense than a soap opera Aug 05, 2009
By Jonathan Voisey
When I saw the subtitle for this book, I assumed it would be largely a bit of spiritual propaganda. In reality, the book has almost nothing to do with the tag line. Instead it is largely a suspenseful action/mystery.... thing. If that were it, and the book stuck just to the main plot of some SEALs trying to save the world from a crazy terrorist out to kill the infidels, the book could have worked.
But instead, the plot was full of twists on par with the campiest soap operas. It has people dying and coming back with amnesia and plastic surgery. It has masters of disguise parading around pulling deus ex's to drive the plot. It works in an "elixir of life" which allows a character to get shot 9 times and walk away. It even worms in references to 2012 nonsense, a reference to Planet X and space aliens "intelligently designing" humans to be slaves.
It's a moderately entertaining story (albeit a played out one) wrapped in a thick layer of kool-aid level nonsense.
2 of 3 found the following review helpful:
Didn't even finish this one Jul 30, 2009
By Cheryl H
"compulsive reader"
Hopefully the paper version doesn't have as many problems as the Kindle version.
1. The formatting is horrible. There isn't so much as a blank line to indicate transitions between scenes. There are also numerous places where part of a sentence that doesn't fit the context appears in the middle of another sentence.
2. Words are misused often enough to be annoying. For example illicit a response vs. elicit a response.
3. The story itself isn't that great either. There are too many convenient incidents that could have been more plausibly explained, such as suddenly feeling flushed and dizzy because someone was watching through a window rather than just having the animal struggle to explain an accidental needle stick. I can't decide if the colonel is a wimp for always getting knocked out or a tough guy because he fully recovers seconds after having no pulse. Dialogs are stilted and transitions are abrupt.
This reads like an unedited rough draft. I'm sorry I wasted my money on this one.
2 of 3 found the following review helpful:
Action packed thiller. Dec 05, 2008
By Monica Garcia
"ReadingWithMonie.com"
In 1992 Navy Seal George Anders and his team are assigned to a mission in Iraq to track down Fahkir Kaseem. Kaseem is a terrorist who recruited a group of Russian scientists with the intention of creating a biological weapon that could potentially eliminate two-thirds of the world's population. Unfortunately one of the scientists is brought in against her will and as George and the team spoil Kaseem's plans he falls in love with Annelia and she's taken away from him under ill-fated circumstances.
Fast forward sixteen years later and a new bad guy is working on the same bio-weapon and Annelia is taken against her will again.
I usually describe more of the book but I feel like I'd give away too much if I added anymore. The book was action packed from the first page and I kept reading long past the time when I would have put down any other book.
The storyline is unique with an extremely surprising ending. I enjoyed the interaction between the characters especially the Navy Seal team members. The one thing I think the book is lacking is just a little more background to the characters so that they become a little more real to the reader. Other than that I recommend this book for all action and thriller lovers.
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