Dan Murphy's Blog

So it has been a few books since I read a James Rollins novel and this one sounded interesting.  Under a volcano in the Arctic a giant underground cavern is found with multiple layers and depths of tunnels.  As scientists start to explore this area the first team is lost and a second is sent in to figure out what happened.  But they do sort of forget to mention that to the second team that they are their second try.  With this new group they hope to explore what is down there and maybe find the original team.  They run into some cave dwellings underground that might be clues as to who or what is down here.  I would say that this book is very close to Ice Hunt, but I would have to say I liked Ice Hunt a little better.  Maybe it was because it was the first book I read like that so I felt it was better.  Either way this is still a good read and James does a great job with the plot and characters.  I did feel it ended a little abruptly but the ending did work with the storyline.

So this is a continuation of the Old Man’s War series, there are 5 of them in total.  In this sequel to the original we follow the Special Defense Forces aka The Ghost Brigade that we learned about from the first book.  It seems that a few of our biggest enemies in the universe are grouping together and are going to destroy humanity.  The only insight into how they are going to do this is a new Ghost Brigades member Jared Dirac who is a little unique as far as how he was created and what he already knows.

As with the first one I like this book because its Sci-Fi but not too nerdy and is an easy read.  I like the fact I started with the first book and moved onto this one as I felt I already had a connection to some of the characters who had more of  a minor role in the book as we are introduced to some new characters.  I look forward to reading the next book in the series.  But think I might take a break from outer-space and come back to Earth for a book or two!

Somewhere along my long life of a whopping 30 years, a 320 page book I now consider a ‘quick read’.  I was able to read this book in about 5 days and that was with a day or two of not reading it.  Also I would like to reiterate to not choose a book by its cover.  This book was suggested to me for those who liked Daemon and I was looking for a book along the lines of Sci-Fi but not too nerdy or far out there (uhmm Snow Crash!).  So the main story here is after your 75th birthday on Earth you are allowed to join the Colonial Defense Forces (CDF) and go fight a war that is brewing out in space.  The thing is you know nothing about what really happens in the CDF because it is kept totally secret to everyone on Earth other than you can enroll when you are 75 and you can never return.  Well since most people at 75 figured they have lived a good life and are tired of being old they join the CDF.  They all assume they will undergo some magical change when the join the CDF, because after all who would want a 75 year old on the front lines.  The story takes them to a bunch of different battles and friends and relationships are made along the way.  John Perry our main character here is followed during this time.  On Earth John was a writer for an advertising firm, but that doesn’t matter as no matter what your job was on Earth for the first 2 years (assuming you live that long) you are general infantry and fight along side with doctors and the homeless in this new place.

This is the first book in a series of 5 and since it was such a fast read I am now on the second one the Ghost Brigades.  Which the title didn’t mean anything to me until I finished Old Man’s War.  This story is very closely related to an Avatar storyline which is probably a pretty classic story of old people wanting to be young again!  I enjoy the authors writing style and the book moves quickly and isn’t too Sci-Fi or nerdy.

So I was looking for a new author and maybe a new series of books to start reading so I went through Amazon and drilled through the categories until I got to the spy category.  These books (there are 6 of them) were all rated really high and had a common review of James Bond in the 21st century.  Alex Hawke the main character here has a family lineage that goes back to a famous pirate in the Caribbean.  He is a wealthy billionaire who owns a bunch of companies and has a strong military background.  I found this book fun to read as it was a good mix of ocean and spy that I have become a fan of recently.  I am also a fan of a writer who can keep his reader interested in the last few chapters of the book and this one is a huge page turner especially at the end.  Also I think I have some weird British thing going on with all my books lately as they seem to all be British people, maybe it is because it makes for fun dialog.  The basics of the story is that Cuba has decided it wants to be a global power player to it adds a few heavy duty weapons to its arsenal.  I also think its funny that Fidel Castro has a part in this book which was entertaining!  I would recommend this author and look forward to continuing the adventures of Alex Hawke.  I typically break up a series with one book in between just to keep it a little more interesting then reading them back to back so I don’t get tired of the authors writing style.

So this one has been on my list for a while and I finally got around to downloading it and reading it.  James Rollins has become an author that I have really enjoyed reading and this book would fall in line as well.  The main story here is that there is a secret sect trying to find history that has been lost for centuries.  This group, the Dragons Court, prides themselves on knowing everything there is to know about the past as they feel this is where the true power comes from, knowledge.  They have run across some old manuscripts they stole that allude to a power that has been lost for centuries and will do anything to get it.  The Vatican is the main location for most of this story but it does revolve around the Mediterranean area.  A special US forces team is brought in with the help of the Vatican to procure this information before the Dragon’s Court can get a hold of it.  One thing I really like about this book is at the end James Rollins goes through the what is fact and what is fiction and also gives some references he had for the writing of the book.  I am a big fan of these half true fictions and find them fun to read.  I am also a big fan of how James Rollins ends his books as they are always page turners in the end and have a good conclusion.  Of the James Rollins books I have read so far I would say this is my least favorite, but still a very good book.  I just found the history a little hard to follow but I did enjoy the book.

This book came to me via a visit to Barnes and Noble as one of the new books to the market.  It looked interesting so of course I downloaded it and went to my friendly Kindle for the read.  The story with this book is writing in first person from a Sniper in the US Army that is working in Saudi Arabia.  There is a huge coup going on and in the mists of it we find out that Saudi Arabia has 5 nuclear weapons.  At the head of the coup is Kyle’s (the sniper) arch enemy that he tried to kill in previous battle.  This book also brings in a few other countries to play in the game like China that might be interested in Saudi Arabia’s resources.  It was a quick read and I thought well written, however the characters were not as multi-dimensional or developed as I would have liked I did enjoy this book and think if you are looking for a good sniper novel this might be a good choice for you.  As I mentioned I enjoy books that boarder on reality with a little bit of fun in them.  I found this book to be pretty predictive in its moves and characters.

This was an awesome book and a quick read as I had a big problem putting it down.  This is my second James Rollins book and what can I say I am now a full fledged fan!  The story line starts out with a solar eclipse that triggers a giant earthquake that levels multiple continents and Air Force One disappears into the Pacific Ocean.  The main character Jack, a retired Navy Seal is brought in to help search for Air Force One with his salvage ship as he is retired and spends his time treasure hunting.   Jack ends up getting dragged into a giant conspiracy and needs to find out the cause for the earth quakes.  This book has some great character development and I am really a fan of the authors style of writing.  It does end a little abruptly but I think it works in this case.  I look forward to reading another James Rollins book in the near future!

I decided I wanted to pick up a jet book as it has been a while (HAWX) since I have read something in that genre.  This was  little interesting because it does fall on the serious side of being in the military and how it can weigh on a pilots mind.  This book is about the Vietnam war and follows a squadron of A-6 Intruders (Navy) as they go on their nightly bombing runs. In the beginning of the book the main character’s bombardier dies in action, you do not really get to know this person and have no feelings for this man dieing and then the rest of the book is sort of based on that vendetta towards the Vietnamese for killing him.  Perhaps if there was an extra chapter or two where you got to know the bombardier it would have been a little more impactful.  The book really picks up on intensity towards the end and then it just ends, I cannot remember reading a book that just ends so quickly! It was a good break but a little too serious for me and a little depressing but still a good read.  I just found out this was made into a movie and looked at the cast and had a laugh and thought they did a good job casting the roles.

Ah yes my good friend Nina (Lara Croft) and her bodyguard/husband Chase are back for another fun adventure.  I wanted to read this book after watching the show Chasing Mummies because it reminded me how much I enjoy these types of stories.  Also this one was a little bit more lighter than the Freedom book I finished right before this that was very complex and a great read but I wanted something I could laugh at and enjoy and this was a great pick.  In this adventure they are on the search for Excalibur, King Author’s sward from the sward in the stone.  It seems that this sward contains special materials that would be helpful in building, what else, a weapon of mass destruction.  Good news is the Russians are the bad guys and Chase and Nina are out to stop them.  Once again a great read and I really like Andy’s style of writing and plan on mixing in and out his books with others.  Not too sure what I think of the development of the characters into a husband and wife relationship I like it better when they just met but it actually didn’t effect the plot as much as I thought it would.  Either way still a great read and highly recommended!

So this book came on my radar because of HAWX, I really liked the idea of another military fighter type book and this was a good choice.  The odd thing while going through my mental list of all the books I have read I almost forgot about this one.  So maybe that says something about the book, or maybe I am getting old and having a hard time remembering things!  Anyways this book is about all the governments that hate the US, and there are a lot of them, conspiring to start a war on us without us knowing it was them.  They manage to commandeer a bunch of drone aircraft and plan on using them to reek havoc on the US.  This was a good read and once again made me a little worried about our national security and how easy something like this would be able to actually do.  I look forward to more books from this author to fill a hole that Tom Clancy might have left wide open.  Once again I will mention how worried I was about something like this actually happening…