17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Michael's Once Again Fixing Things for Others, August 18, 2008
It was supposed to be a nice lunch with his mother at a fancy hotel. Instead, Michael Weston winds up leaving quickly when he notices agents everywhere on the patio. No, he isn't being paranoid. But they weren't out for him but his ex-girlfriend Fiona. Investigating further, he discovers that Fi was set up by Natalya. Natalya is former KGB and is in a bit of a bind. Seems if she doesn't come up with the money she is accused of stealing, she will be killed. She blames Michael for her problem, so she's giving him the same choice.
Meanwhile, Sam has agreed to help Cricket O'Connor, a woman who fell in love with the wrong man. Her husband has disappeared with most of her money, and thugs keep showing up demanding the rest. Somehow, Michael has to track down the guy's real identity and then get Cricket's money back. Can he do it while keeping Natalya at bay?
Here's the great news. If you are a fan of the TV show this book is based on you will love it. The characters are spot on, including a couple recurring characters who shows up. Michael narrates the book for us, so the entire thing feels exactly like one of his voice overs from the show. All the action and humor of the show translate perfectly to the written page.
Even if you aren't familiar with the show, you should be able to follow the basics. We're given enough information that all the relationships make sense.
Unfortunately, I had a couple problems with the plot. While it was fast paced and kept me reading, a couple times I wondered why exactly the characters were doing what they were doing. I quite possibly did miss something, but I couldn't figure it out by rereading parts of the book. Additionally, the language is a little worse than what they can get away with on TV, especially in a couple scenes. These are both minor issues, and on the whole I really did enjoy the book.
This was a pleasant read. Fans of the TV show will love having it as a tide me over between episodes. And it just might bring some new fans into the fold.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Great Idea, Poor Execution, March 24, 2009
I was very excited to see a paperback of my favorite TV show. I wish this had lived up to my excitement. Instead, it was a very long, somewhat boring attempt at capturing these great characters and sticking them in a book. The characters were molded to fit the authors writing style. Michael was too cynical, Sam too slovenly and Madeline too annoying. The only person who was close to accurate was Fiona, but it would be difficult not to portray her accurately as she's fairly one dimensional.
The "voice over" that works so well on the show is drawn out and over done in the book. Frequently, a page or two goes by between dialog while we get instructions on the history of whatever; Fisher Island, a magazine, a half dozen branches of the secret service.
I'll stick to the actual TV series which it top notch. I'm off to buy the DVD's now.
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14 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Tod Goldberg Captures Michael Westen's Voice Perfectly, August 6, 2008
BURN NOTICE, featuring Jeffrey Donovan in a role that seems made-to-order for him, became my favorite television show during the summer of 2007. With support characters like the incredibly sexy Gabrielle Anwar and Bruce Campbell flanking him, I am constantly in awe and in love with every episode. I've yet to feel slighted with last year's season or this year's.
Tod Goldberg, brother to Lee Goldberg who has written the DIAGNOSIS: MURDER and MONK tie-in novels as well as a few episodes of the latter, was chosen to write at least three tie-in novels featuring the BURN NOTICE crew. The first, BURN NOTICE: THE FIX, is set to release on August 5, but I found a copy this week and burned through it during a plane flight.
One of the things I enjoy most about the television show is the quirky humor. Another is the first-person narrative in which burned spy Michael Westen talks to the audience and explains spy thinking and the realities of the world. Oh - and the gadgets. LOVE the gadgets.
Goldberg's book, thankfully, is chockfull of the humor and the inside knowledge that brims from the television episodes. The book reads like an episode of the television series, only it's played out longer and deeper than any 43-minute episode could equal. There are a lot more players in this one, and Goldberg plays them all well. The blend becomes exciting and intoxicating immediately.
I loved the setup of the book that got everything underway. Michael is having lunch with his mother and notices too many people watching him. Since he doesn't recognize any of them, he knows they're not there for him. In a split-second he reasons that they're there after Fiona Glenanne, his ex-lover and present/sometime partner. She used to be an IRA bomber and now supplements her income buy selling illegal weapons in Miami where the US government quarantined Michael.
In no time at all, Michael is also involved with another ex-lover/ex-enemy who blackmails him into getting three million dollars for her. She says she's in debt to the people she works for because they think she's been trafficking in illegal goods and keeping it off the books.
Then Sam Axe (played by Bruce Campbell) drops by to ask Michael for help on a project that dropped into his lap via his girlfriend Veronica. Since Sam's a retired Navy SEAL, he's biding his time sleeping with rich women that keep him in the lifestyle to which he's become accustomed until his Navy pension kicks in.
One of Veronica's women friends, Cricket O'Connor, has been preyed upon by her husband, who turns out to be a real louse. I could feel Michael's frustration on every page as his world comes apart while he deals with his problem and all the problems his family and friends insist on dumping on him. Even more than that, Fiona is jealous enough to kill the woman pressuring Michael, and he's thinking maybe that wouldn't be such a bad deal.
Goldberg is spot on with this one. As I read the witty dialogue, snappy patter, and gleaned the twists and turns that hammered Michael and that he manufactured, I saw the television episode unwind inside my head. Goldberg has the characters down cold and there wasn't a false move throughout. He plays them off each other perfectly.
After this romp through the novel based on the show, I'm really looking forward to the next pair. Hopefully, though, the books will become an ongoing enterprise. Although the summer season is going to feature 16 episodes this year, eight in the summer and eight in the winter, there's still a lot of time in between. Tod Goldberg's novels will definitely help cover those months for fans of the show.
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