Rating: 
Summary: Lot of hype
Review: "S.O.A.R." is poorly written, with little to hook a reader from the start. It is obvious Weisman has a tremendous publicist given the extensive list of notables who made positive comment. I would not recommend anyone wasting their time to read this when there are other exciting novels on SpecOps available.
Rating:
Summary: Lot of hype
Review: "S.O.A.R." is poorly written, with little to hook a reader from the start. It is obvious Weisman has a tremendous publicist given the extensive list of notables who made positive comment. I would not recommend anyone wasting their time to read this when there are other exciting novels on SpecOps available.
Rating: 
Summary: Black Ops
Review: As a lifetime career CIA special operations officer, I feel N.Y. Times best selling author John Weisman has reached a new plateau with his latest book SOAR. This action-packed thriller brings the reader deep inside the black world of special operations where America's finest warriors take on extremely important and dangerous missions in the World's most remote and dangerous locations. Although SOAR is fiction, the characters are taken from known veterans of America's tighly knit special operations community. Weisman brings realism to the story through excellent research on such topics as high altitude, high-opening (HAHO) parachuting, demolitions, sniper techniques, ambushes, weaponry, explosive ordnance disposal (EOD), fixed wing and helicopter operations, modern technical devices and basic unit tactics. In this regard, SOAR is a must read for even the most experienced current operator. The author further adds realism by shifting back to past historical events, relating the story to black-ops heroes known to us all. I highly recommend this edge-of-the-seat action thriller. You will find it difficult to put the book down. Rudy Enders, CIA Retired. Former Chief, Special Operations Group.
Rating:
Summary: Black Ops
Review: As a lifetime career CIA special operations officer, I feel N.Y. Times best selling author John Weisman has reached a new plateau with his latest book SOAR. This action-packed thriller brings the reader deep inside the black world of special operations where America's finest warriors take on extremely important and dangerous missions in the World's most remote and dangerous locations. Although SOAR is fiction, the characters are taken from known veterans of America's tighly knit special operations community. Weisman brings realism to the story through excellent research on such topics as high altitude, high-opening (HAHO) parachuting, demolitions, sniper techniques, ambushes, weaponry, explosive ordnance disposal (EOD), fixed wing and helicopter operations, modern technical devices and basic unit tactics. In this regard, SOAR is a must read for even the most experienced current operator. The author further adds realism by shifting back to past historical events, relating the story to black-ops heroes known to us all. I highly recommend this edge-of-the-seat action thriller. You will find it difficult to put the book down. Rudy Enders, CIA Retired. Former Chief, Special Operations Group.
Rating:
Summary: Misnamed, but a really good read.
Review: Having quickly tired of the Rogue Warrior series that John Weisman co-authored with Dick Marcinko, I was not too sure about reading his solo effort. I am certainly glad that I did. This is a real tale of adventure and action, and except for the obligatory (it seems) device of having a woman interjected into the mission, it reflects the sense of duty of special operations warriors. The spec op troops this time are Delta operators who are beginning to get the publicity that the SEAL community started drawing about 10 years ago when Marcinko told his story on "60 Minutes." Since Eric Haney's book on Delta and the popularity of "Blackhawk Down," Delta's being pulled out of the shadows. So far, the speculation about them and what they do has not been too outrageous, but I'm sure that's just around the corner. Weisman's book is long on accuracy in many areas, not the least of which are tactics and weaponry. And I can personally vouch for the fact that in any critical operation, if anything is going to give you major heartburn, it will be comm problems. And comms are a problem for the Delta operators in this book... just like real life. There will be some complaints about characterizations (shallow but who needs a character's family history in a war story), stereotypes (they're stereotypes because they're true), and miltary derring do (face it: military people ARE brave and dedicated, especially those who make a career in special operations and doing the hard things their government requires). No, this is a good book. Hopefully there will be others of like quality. However, why Weisman chose to name the book SOAR (an acronym for the Special Operations Aviation Regiment, the "Nightstalkers") escapes me. And a note to the publisher: find a better jacket for the next one. Hoo-yah! John. And keep them coming!
Rating:
Summary: Great story, great cast of characters
Review: I have to say I too grew tired of the Rogue Warrior and was not too sure of Mr. Weisman's solo effort.
I am very pleasantly surprised with SOAR.
I found myself caught up in the chase and was able to loose myself in the wilds of China for the day and a half it took me to devour this thriller.
I liked the Delta Force team as well as the spooks, I thought the female was a bit much, but in the end her character proved to be of little concern to me in the overall scheme of the story.
Keep it up John Weisman!
Rating:
Summary: A great read from a real pro...
Review: I really enjoyed SOAR...it is a fast moving and thrilling yarn. As you may know, John Weisman co-wrote all of the Rogue Warrior novels. John is a real spec-ops insider...and I found the book's warriors, tactics, and equipment to be an exciting glimpse into the shadowy world of the CIA and special operations community. Bravo Zulu!
Rating:
Summary: Weisman's best work to date--the best read of the summer
Review: I've been a John Weisman fan since the early ROGUE WARRIOR books. (Marcinko may have been the featured attraction, but it was Weisman's writing that made the books so enjoyable.) It's great to see him out from under Marcinko's shadow. And with SOAR, Mr. Weisman has finally proven that he doesn't need anyone to tell a superb and exciting story. I read SOAR in one day--and with it, Weisman has joined the ranks of Clancy, Coonts, Dale Brown, and the best of the techno-thriller writers. All the Weisman trademarks, the ones we loved in the Rogue Warrior novels are here--the author's skill with action scenes, descriptions of the latest cutting edge technology, and the edge-of-the-seat suspense we expect from the genre. Highly recommended, and the best read of the summer.
Rating:
Summary: Highly suspenseful and entertaining from start to finish
Review: I've been looking forward to more like this from John Weisman since the last Rogue Warrior novel he penned, Detachment Bravo, and SOAR was even better than I had expected. I can't tell you anything about the story without ruining a few surprises, so I won't, but if you enjoy spec ops books like the Rogue Warrior series or Andy McNab's Nick Stone novels, you will love this. Highly suspenseful and entertaining from start to finish, you will have a very hard time putting it down. If you have to get up early for work, don't start reading it at night because you won't get to sleep on time.
Rating: 
Summary: Research overwhelms the story
Review: If you're looking for a fairly quick, Clancy-esque beach read, you could do worse than SOAR. I know, that's not exactly a ringing endorsement. But this action yarn has all the realism in technical details and battle engagements that you'd wish for-and for some people that's all they want. SOAR is about a secret Delta Force rescue mission to extract a covert CIA operations team from western China after the latter has been captured by Uighur terrorists. The "Mission Impossible"-like rescue also involves a lot of shooting, bomb-making, and the defusing of a nuclear weapon. It's basically an action movie (with a lamentable lack of gratuitous sex). The problem is that the characters are only sketchily drawn; they basically exist for their roles or skills. One might as well have called them "CIA Guy No. 1," "CIA Guy No. 2," "Delta Guy No. 1," etc. The guys in "The Dirty Dozen" had more personality. The politicos in Washington seem to have a little more depth, but that's at least in part because John Weisman seems to have adapted the personalities of some of our current officeholders for these roles. (President Forrest admittedly doesn't seem much like President Bush.) For some reason, there's a token female character, Tracy Wei-Liu, that's dragged through the story line, ostensibly to defuse the nuke. Perhaps the real reason is the short diversion in the latter part of the book in which the main character, Mike Ritzik, engages in a bit of repartee with her on the morality of killing in battle. But Ritzik just gets royally pissed off, and the subject is dropped. In the lead-up to the climax, the characters seem to get sidetracked into a few exchanges like this that, to me, seem unlikely when you're literally under the gun. I guess the author is trying to score a few political points amidst the fun. I, for one, found the preparations for insertion more interesting and exciting than the actual engagement. The battle scenes just seemed a tad tedious after a while. However that may be, I'll look forward to future works by Mr. Weisman. If he can make the people as real as the technology, then he might make something really worthwhile.
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