Last Light

Rating:
Summary: Last Light and maybe a lost series
Review: After reading and enjoying Andy McNab's first two books, Remote Control and Crisis Four with the continuing Nick Stone character I thought I had found a new series. Both were well written featuring interesting characters and plenty of action along with a complex mystery and plot. Andy McNab is a former Commando in the British SAS so he brings an incredible authenticity to the work. When he describes a gun working a certain way or other key details, you know he did not research it off the Internet or found it in some book; he lived it. But, his last book Firewall was a disappointment especially when compared to the first two. Unfortunately, that trend continues in this recent effort.

As this novel opens, Nick Stone has put himself unknowingly into harm's way once again. Desperate for money for himself as well as for treating Kelly (his orphan whose entire family was massacred because of his mistake) he has accepted a contract assassination job from The Firm. The target will appear outside the Houses of Parliament in London, England in what seems to be an officially sanctioned hit at the highest levels of the United States and Britain's governments. Unbeknownst to him, the assassination is one very small part of a much bigger picture that will turn into a trap.

Nick is seconds away from the kill shot when he aborts the attempt for a variety of reasons. Police swarm the area and while he escapes the initial gun battle with police he soon comes under their custody before being transferred to his very unhappy employers. They make their feelings physically known to him before giving him one more chance. The target will be in Panama for the next week. Nick is to go to Panama, surveil the target and complete the assassination, this time without fail. The target must be dead by the last light on Friday evening or they will kill Kelly.

Soon Nick is in Panama and what should have been an action oriented read (despite the nonsense on the back jacket) takes a hard turn into the boredom zone. Along with Columbian guerrillas, United States Government interests, Chinese business interests, politics and the environmental movement become major characters in the work. The action slows to a near halt in the muddy jungles of Panama around the Canal Zone as various characters discuss politics and environmental policy with Nick. Unfortunately, the politics and environmental policy situation are old news for any reader who remotely pays attention to world events and as such, raises the boredom factor substantially. The arguments go on for page after mind numbing page and even after all the discussion and lectures, no solutions are offered to at least to attempt to make the preceding pages have some merit on any level.

That fact along with the fact that the ending is amazingly vague and open ended to create the need for a sequel for all the characters, major and minor, makes this novel the absolute worst of the series to date. While the first two books were good and the third mediocre at best, the fall in this one is amazing. It comes across as the literary equivalent of base-jumping without a parachute. Hopefully, this is as bad as it gets, but Andy McNab is running out of time to save the series from himself.

Rating:
Summary: A Realistic, Gritty, and Suspenseful Tale - Action Packed
Review: It really doesn't get any better than Andy McNab when it comes to military fiction. McNab, a pseudonym of a former SAS soldier, packs so much realism into his stories that the reader can't help but wonder how much is fiction and how much is gleaned from his real life experiences. He uses terminology and phrasing that makes the reader feel as if they are former Regiment themselves, all while weaving a tense and compelling story. This is the type of book that you'll start, and before you know it, you're a hundred pages in.

Last Light is episode four in the Nick Stone series. The action begins on the first page and the reader is instantly pulled into the story. Stone is sent to command a sniper team that is to carry out an assassination of a target at the British parliament. At the last second, Stone realizes that something is very wrong and aborts the mission. He has been set up, but he has an insurance policy that saves his life. However, those who sent him on the mission use Kelly, his 'daughter' (readers who have read the previous McNab books will understand the quotes) to force him to once again attempt to follow his target to Panama and eliminate him by "last light Friday."

Rarely does a book capture the intricacies of individual combat and the technical aspects of both military equipment and tactics so well without losing the flow of the action or interrupting the plot. Such details are so familiar to McNab that they are poured effortlessly into the story without so much as a hiccup. The author does not bother himself with the politics of conflict or large scale ramifications in the manner of a Clancy or a Stephen Coonts - what he gives you is action, raw and authentic.

I highly recommend Last Light as well as the other Nick Stone books - Remote Control, Crisis Four, and Firewall. It is not imperative that they are read in order, but if you want to get a feel for the development of the main character, it would help. Also, read Immediate Action for the non-fiction account of the author's SAS career as well as the EXCELLENT Bravo Two Zero for the story of his team's capture and subsequent torture in Iraq during the gulf war.

Rating:
Summary: Nick Stone the Human, not Nick Stone the Soldier
Review: Last Light is the fourth in the series of books written by Andy McNab. The whole series of books is great and this is no exception. Andy McNab obviously decided when writing this book that he needed to give his character some extra depth. In this book we see Nick Stone make some serious human decisions.

After reading this book you come away with a lesson in survival, in a way it teaches you jungle tracking skills and gives you a good insight into how special operations are coordinated. If you're an SAS or any kind of Special Forces enthusiast it's a good read just to get inside the mind of a professional elite soldier.

I enjoyed this book greatly, the plot keeps you guessing, and its never obvious what's going to happen. Am not going to spoil the book am sure if you want to find out what its about you just read the Amazon.com review but if you enjoyed the rest of the Nick Stone series this book is going to make you very happy.

4 Stars

Rating:
Summary: Good, not great.
Review: So far I have had difficulty putting McNab's books down. Last Light was different - the book did meander a little on more than one occassion and admittedly I read about a third of the book and I wasn't really motivated to come back to it for several weeks.

I did enjoy it while I read it, but there was in general something missing from Last Light that was present in McNab's previous books. The story is good, but not great. Several chapters are a little on the dull side (maybe 'dull' is the wrong word and 'less gripping' is better) and at the end of the book I felt that not enough had really happened from cover to cover.

Personally, I found the climax a little disappointing and less intense than McNab's previous writings. The ending chapter seemed somewhat disconnected from the story itself and more of a re-introduction to the usual beat of the series, but even this failed to capture some of the more touching moments we've previously witnessed with Nick Stone's softer side.

If you're a McNab fan like me, then get this book. You won't be disappointed and you'll remain up to date with the life of Nick Stone. However, this book feels to me to be more of a 'standalone' than part of the Nick Stone series and you'll feel that this isn't quite going to fill the gap as you await the next update.

If you don't know of McNab, I can well recommend earlier Nick Stone books first as I feel that any interest you may potentially have in following this character may not be sparked up by Last Light. I can well recommend Firewall (best novel I ever read) for ultimate excitement, but there is benefit to starting at the beginning of the series too.

Rating:
Summary: Last Light
Review: This is the first Andy McNab book that I have read. I doubt I will read another. His writing is not very gripping and the ending is simply a set up for the next book. His repetitive use of some descriptive phrases actually detracted from his writing style. For example, I lost count of the number of times he used the phrase "threw it down my neck" to describe eating. The first time was clever. After ten or so, it became irritating.