Customer Reviews

The Crisis: A Dan Lenson Novel (Dan Lenson Novels)

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

Finishing this one was a real chore for me. Since The Command, Poyer's last few tales of the modern navy featuring thoughtful protagonist Dan Lenson have been progressively less interesting. This one outdoes all the others in the boredom department.

The modern navy is actually on very limited display. Much of the action is told from the point of view of three African children (the novel is set in an Eritrea-like fictional country). The plight of this region of Africa is a real and terrible one, but neither real not fictional children have much to offer that is new or useful.

Besides the underused Lenson, other characters from earlier Poyer novels reappear, chiefly SEAL 'Obie' Oberg, whose parts of the story are the only sections of any interest. An improbable NCIS investigator also makes a second appearance and is even less believable than she was before. In what at first looked to be a mildly interesting subplot, Lenson and a female officer who had served with him before seem to develop a mutual attraction - but this storyline never goes anywhere, much like the novel itself.

For his next effort, I hope Poyer either returns Lenson to a more nautical setting or else reinstalls him in a political role where at least something of interest is happening. The author's continuing detachment from his feature character may indicate that he feels he has mined Lenson for all the character development he is good for. If so, that's fine, but then there's no need for him to keep writing novels set in the 'Lensonverse,' or to include Lenson at all.

The western governments are very concerned with the civil war in Ashaara on the strategically important Horn of Africa. The constant fighting has sent the country into deepening destitution with shortages in sustenance life necessities in a place that was already overrun with abject poverty. If the spiral turns any worse, Ashaara could become a nation void of central authority and home to outlaws and Jihadists.

To prevent this horror from turning even more calamitous, the US Navy sends Commander Dan Lenson and his Tactical Analysis Group into the area to provide humanitarian aid to the besieged masses and to train a patrol squad in the Red Sea. With chaos the norm, Lenson and his unit realizes they cannot distribute the assistance without an infrastructure followed if successful by a force to weed out terrorists. However, what seems obvious to aid the forlorn proves complex and ugly as internal and external forces see the region as a ripe place for their specific agenda with people being damned.

The Crisis is a super thought provoking thriller that will have readers pondering ethical and logistical questions involving aid to nations desperately in need but lack the infrastructure to make proper distribution. The story line is fast-paced from the moment TAG and its leader receive the assignment, but really takes off in Africa when the team learns the boots on the ground dynamics of the situation is appallingly chaos. Alliance switch within a murmur and helping the indigent is impossible due to avarice of leaders who seek wealth or ideological and religious advantage over truly caring for the downtrodden.

Harriet Klausner

This book has nothing to do with the Lenson that we grew to enjoy - exhausted naval officer. Poyer come back to your core!

Lets at least get Dan up to Captain with a command first before we put him in TAG permanently.

I have read all of the Dan Lenson novels. This was a big disapointment to me. I expected sea-going adventure and got a story set in the desert of a 3rd world country. The story dragged in places. No doubt author Poyer did some excellent research to write this saga of misguided fanatics doing everything evil in the name of religion, God and hate Americans. Dan Lenson could have been left completely out of the story and it would have stood on its own. Adding "A Dan Lenson Novel" on the cover no doubt helped to sell the books. I was expecting Lenson to get deeply involved, as he has in past stories, and save the day. He did nothing much to contribute to the story. Sort of cameo appearances. I guess that expectation soured me on the story line. Thank goodness for Teddy and his Seal buddies to create some action. Lenson sure didn't. He couldn't even connect with his wife.

I do recommend the story as it gives insight into the difficulties civilized countries face when dealing with religious fanatics who cannot even read and their only accomplishment is to memorize the Koran. This in turn is so ingrained in them that misinterpretation is easily manipulated by the evil Imams and other religious nutcases and zealots to make killing a rightous act if they are a dealing with non believers. Poyer did a good job doing this.

Dan Lenson helps coordinate the US intervention in a fictional Horn of Africa nation collapsing, a la Somalia, into famine and anarchy.

Poyer has a fine ear for the shifting and maneuvering of generals, policy makers, politicians and bureaucrats. To his credit, he finds no easy answers here, as there aren't any. He sees the action through multiple actors - Lenson doesn't see frontline action in this one - who come from various perspectives, including three orphaned siblings, pursuing very different paths of survival after being separated. The eldest has become a charismatic Islamicist warlord who gains control of much of the country.

SEAL Teddy Oberg is violent and sort of a jerk, but his dedication and pure joy in fighting motivate him as his team is sent to liberate ships, free hostages and take down warlords.

Naval CIS agent Aisha Ar-Rahim, caught in country when the collapse begins, finds herself in a strange position. Black, Muslim and Arabic-speaking, she is still seen as an oddity by locals because she's a woman in a position of authority; and meanwhile her Muslim religion and garb leave fellow Americans unclear where her sympathies lie as howling mobs assault the US embassy.

Marine Lance Corporal Caxi Spayer, providing the grunt's-eye view here, befriends the youngest of the three orphans.

Irish researcher Grainne O'Shea - distrustful of Americans - goes through harrowing adventures when cut off deep in the interior. She guards a newly discovered secret she fears getting into the wrong (translation: American or corporate) hands: a huge layer of artesian water that could give the parched country a future.

Overwhelming all of them is the heat and stink of African chaos - you want to take a shower every 30 pages - as a US force tries to distribute relief supplies, secure the capital, and create a new government, meanwhile dealing with venal warlords as well as Washington policymakers who expect them to succeed with only two thousand troops. (The SEAL: "If it didn't suck, they wouldn't send us.")

Citizens live in greatest fear of their own neighbors. Poyer's depictions of violence and depravity, particularly against children, is relentless and disturbing.

Lenson initially comes to the Mideast researching the warfighting techniques of the future, and inadvertantly stumbles into it: small groups of elite fighters like Oberg winning tactical victories with high-tech weapons and support, in the strategic quagmire of countries too far gone to stabilize. Great powers help but don't fully commit, meanwhile seeking the quickest exit and willing to settle for the next dictator as long as he's their boy.

Poyer's latest effort shows a level of research and sophistication usually absent in the techno-thriller genre. His books have shown increasing sophistication, and this one brings his sharp eye to the problem of American intervention in a decidedly third world country. It is, first of all, an engrossing read, and one that I only reluctantly put down. As I was reading the book, the "crisis" was unfolding in Haiti, and many of the issues raised in Poyer's book were played out in that setting. Our intervention in third world countries is more complicated than some would admit. For example, unlike some other writers in this area, Poyer does not see Islam as a monolithic, terrorist organization, but as a faith that, just as any religion, may be twisted to justify horrific acts, and used to further political agendas. The warning implicit in this book is that of unintended consequences of well-meaning policy. Even if we were to really understand the culture, language and history of one of these very foreign places, how all these interact with our overwhelming capacity to exert power is not well understood. It is a cautionary tale, and one that may not comfort those who see the US, and US military power as the solution to the world's problems.

I have long been a follower of David Poyer based on his accurate approach to Naval fiction. But this book has very little Naval in it and Lemson isn't even the central character. Way too much prose and too much sand. There is a whole lot more moral reflection than action. Perhaps Poyer sees the world as no longer a world of potential Naval conflicts without a place for even a littoral Navy. If so, he should put his pen away and enjoy fishing. I will have a hard time taking the risk of buying his next novel.
Larry

While lesser works jump to the top of the best seller lists, others labor to find a wider audience. The author has produced a wonderful story with a cast of characters the reader cares about. He shows us the good and the bad, and makes them real. The action and technology are informed and hard hitting. A great timely effort.

I think the writer went one book to far with this one. The story is told through characters that don't belong in this genre but rather belong on the Oprah show.
And what's up with all the foreign language that the writer doesn't bother to translate? Why not just use English throughout the book?
I really liked the Poyer stories up till now but maybe he should take a break for a bit.

I like the multiple perspectives that Poyer uses in The Crisis (similar to The Med and The Gulf.) Some reviewers here rate the book lower because of it, but I prefer when Poyer writes with some moral complexity. The issues behind the action are current and authentic (sometimes, as with China Sea, is premise seems hard to believe.) Overall, I think this is my favorite Lenson novel.