Customer Reviews

Act of War

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(7)
1 star:		(18)

 

 

Been a long time Brown reader, but after this disater of a story, I think I'll give up. The only thing missing is the illustrations for this cartoon story that isn't even interesting or exciting on a fantasy level. I rolled my eyes and found myself wondering if Brown meant this as a comedy. When it was clear he intended it as a techno thriller I just felt sad for his lost art. It reminded me of a 6th graders creative story writing project. Sad sad sad.

OK - we've got battlesuits instead of robot planes I guess so we can have people be put in harms way.

Pretty much this was blah and boring.

And it's got a stupid sex scene in it - Dale Brown's characters tend to be on the iffy side anyway but he should just NEVER write about sex.

Stick to airplanes!

This was my first Dale Brown book and will be my last. While the book started with an interesting premise of terrorists using nukes against the US, it quickly degraded into something barely worthy of a comic book. The so-called hero is pathetically lame and all of the other characters are complete cardboard cut-outs (especially Sargent-MAJOR Jefferson). Maybe a cartoon show about the exoskeleton (the main character I think) in action might appeal to 8 year olds. I will stick with Vince Flynn and Brad Thor from now on.

Act of War? How about "Act of Prostitution"?!

As I understand it, women, as a group, are much bigger purchasers of books these days than men. Falling into the latter category, that's bad news for me if I don't happen to be in the mood to read about crime solving cats or unfulfilling relationships that take place in picturesque settings somewhere in the foggy English countryside. Consequently, when my library does purchase an audio book with a male friendly theme, the occasion is not taken lightly. Double then, is my disappointment in this work.

What is it about technological thrillers and the people who inhabit them? Is it so hard to create compelling characters to go alongside the fantastic devices and events that propel such works? While the theme of this book holds promise, the execution is disastrous. Brown's characters are the worst kind of boring stereotypes... trite and dimensionless, you get the feeling they were drawn-up with a crayon on the back of a cocktail napkin. (An affliction that also seems to have fatally struck Clive Cussler in the similarly infantile Lost City) These shortcomings are never more plain than when any of them open their mouths. The inane platitudes and by-the-numbers cliché statements that are intended to pass for military jargon had me rolling my eyes and wondering how this guy ever got a book deal in the first place.

Taken in this context, the haphazard plotting and improbable technologies pale as problems. Do yourselves a favor and insist on investing your time reading something better. In the meantime, perhaps we can convince Mr. Brown to get to work on an "Act of Contrition" ...for foisting this mess upon us!

I have little patience with technological yarns in which the key technology is not thoroughly supported. In this story the reader is required to simply accept that the superhuman strength and agility of the superman costume at the center of everything is achievable. I don't accept that, and the author does nothing to change my mind.

What the author presents us is a gadget flitting about overturning humvees and other heavy objects, supposedly using hydraulic power. Hydraulic devices certainly can lift heavy objects, but the pumps, tubing, and cylinders required are way larger than anything fitting inside something as compact as the gadget described in this novel. And if you want your hydraulic device to be capable of exerting great power and at the same time responding like a gazelle, its complexity would make it even more cumbersome.

If you can overlook this quibble, then the story might entertain you for a couple of hours, although the characters and writing are not all that well developed. It is a case of plot trumping everything else, which is a frequent fault of this sort of technological novelizing.

Dale Brown is always interesting to read because you can never be certain of what he will come up with. Sometimes, of course, as with any person who experiments, the results are less than optimal.

On his first outing with a new theme, Brown has created an enjoyable techno-thriller, but compared to his greatest stuff, it is middling at best. However, the new cast of characters he has created will undoubtedly appear again and I expect that as he becomes more familiar with his characters, that a blockbuster or two will emerge.

"Act Of War" is definitely not a blockbuster, but it isn't a bad read.

A petro facility on the outskirts of Houston is nuked. (Talk about starting off with a bang.) The facility is owned by Harold Chester Kingman, the master of TransGlobal Energy Corporation. Needless to say, Kingman and TransGlobal are stereotyped: the greedy capitalist who uproots peasants from their homes, yada, yada. While government is still mobilizing to cope with the disaster, Kristen Skyy, ace reporter for SATCOM One TV news helicopters into the area, reporting live. Lois Lane, Superman's pal, is more believable, but Brown has a purpose for Skyy. Oh golly, the superheated air around the blast site forces Skyy's helicopter down just as they were about to rescue some schoolchildren from the blast zone!

No need to fear, though, for Major Jason Richter appears in his CID, a nine-foot exoskeleton affair with some rather amazing capabilities. The good Major rescues Kristen, the children and becomes a hero, especially so it seems to Robert Chamberlain, National Security Advisor.

Within days, Chamberlain has formed a special task force to hunt down terrorists. The task force is strange, co-commanded by Richter, who is an Army engineer, and an FBI intelligence analyst, along with an Army Sergeant Major, who is Chamberlain's aide. Amazingly, Richter clashes with the FBI agent about strategy, tactics and the time of day.

Things move quickly now as the FBI gains information that a Braizillian environmentalist group called GAMMA seems to be the perpetrators of the nuclear explosion. Of course, the FBI doesn't share that information with Richter: he gains that knowledge by eavesdropping with more high-tech devices.

The story moves fast now, with the task force heading off to Brazil and the introduction of a somewhat mysterious Russian who has taken over GAMMA and plans still greater destruction.

Brown is a great action writer who has a pretty fair grasp of the technology of today and the near future. Generally his characters have quite a bit of depth: not so this time. Most of the characters are weak, but I am certain they will be far stronger in future novels featuring Richter and CID. Brown's plot also seems a bit off this time around.

Overall, though, "Act Of War" is still a good read for any techno-thriller fan. It is neither Brown's best or his worst: but it is still better than the work of many of his imitators in this genre. A good book for a day at the beach or out in the yard.

Jerry

OK, I know that Dale Brown is not Tom Clancy, but I have all his books and for the most part they aren't too bad. Most of them are pretty exciting techno-thrillers that get started really fast and keep going. This thing is the worst piece of tripe I have ever read! There is a plot, but the author tries to stretch a 25 page short story into 400 pages of boring, repetitive dialog. The first 200 pages alone consist of the characters mainly struggling arguing with each one another on how to run a special terrorist ops group. At any rate, if this is the new direction for Dale Brown books, I will be looking for a new author because this book is not worth the time to read it.

This book has inspired me. I figure that if it can become ubiquitous in airports and make the author some money, why can't I write something similar and soak some up? It is probably the worst written book I have ever read. I bought it in an airport, trusting it would be the typical counter-terrorism/spy junk novel that, though pretty banal, would be nonetheless enjoyable.

Although I have managed to suffer through most of its pages (this morning, about 85-90% the way through I through it in the recycling bin, I just cannot take anymore of it), the storyline is not just unbelievable, but simply silly. The dialogue between characters is unreal--surely most of them need to be medicated or at least slapped back into their senses. One moment somebody will be courteous and another they will snap at little, if any provocation. I don't want to spoil it, but something the president asks to pass with congress was comical and I nearly put the book down as soon as I read it.

I think that Brown's writing is about the quality of a well educated and precocious 14 year old, but certainly not a weathered writer. This was the first Dale Brown book I ever wrote and it goes without saying it will be the last. It's a travesty that I had to pay for this tripe.

Let me put it in perspective: I read Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell, a book that was ported in theme into a video game on the XBox and it was a far better book.

Wow...was this written by Dale Brown's administrative weenie alter-ego. Let me sum it up! If you like books that exhaustively delve into government forms/procedures/ and meeting rules/regulations...stop...because you've found your book!! If ,instead, you remember the Military action/adventure writer named Dale Brown then I am sure he's still out there somewhere...just not present in this book! BORING!

Dale Brown had been going down hill for years and reached his low point with this one. Time to take up a new profession.