Customer Reviews

Dance with the Dragon (Kirk McGarvey Novels)

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

An outstanding thriller. I have not read a Hagberg novel since Joshua's Hammer many years ago. It was good but there are so many excellent espionage writers today that I simply lost touch with Mr. Hagberg and his protagonist CIA operative Kirk McGarvey. Well, after reading Dance with the Dragon I am going to go back and read all the previous McGarvey books in the series. In essence, Dance with the Dragon is a tightly written, well thought out espionage story with numerous twists and turns to keep the reader on their mental toes. The plot flows with ease and just when you think you have it figured out it makes a hard turn keeping you guessing. Excellent use of detail and espionage trade craft. Fast paced with plenty of action, but presented in a realistic light so that the reader does not become jaded or fatigued.
Basically, The story revolves around a "rogue"(?) Chinese top espionage agent, General Liu, and his past and present secretive actions and life. He is a devious, sexual deviant, egocentric sociopath that prides himself on his ability to outwit and control everything and everyone in his surroundings. He is extremely successful until he goes too far and has murdered a CIA operative in Mexico. Enter Kirk McGarvey, retired DCI (Director of Central Intelligence), who is asked by the current DCI to investigate the death. Thus commences the "Dance" between McGarvey and Liu. Excellently told, David Hagberg weaves a wonderfully intricate tale of suspense, love, death, and action.
One of the highlights of this book is the superb character development throughout. Mr. Hagberg does a terrific job of fleshing out ALL his characters, warts and all. He goes to great lengths to insure the reader has an understanding of what is motivating the story's diverse cast of characters. His use of descriptive dialog between the characters is both energetic and informative and helps build the story's suspense.
Some EXTREME and graphic sex and violence. Be warned that Mr. Hagberg pulls no punches and some of the narrative could be upsetting to some readers. All germane to the story but explicit. Some strong language but in the real world of espionage this is how people talk.
Highly recommended. Excellent for that long, boring transoceanic flight or wait in the dentist office.

The book i ordered was written by George R R Martin, the book i was sent was by another author. The company said the mix up was obvious and to return the book to the main warehouse and they would pay shipping. I am waiting at this time to see if I get my money back for the book and the shipping.

I have read all of the Kirk McGarvey novels that this author has written, this being the tenth and it was not until this one that I was disappointed in both the story line and the writing.

The entire novel is a prelude to the next one and is completely tied up with trying to unravel the mystery of the next big attack which is going to be visited on the United States.

The story is largely centered in Mexico where odd things are going on at the CIA Station there. An agent is murdered and brutally beheaded. There seems to be a link between this act and the agent's activities involving the Chinese embassy. That's just the problem. There are bits and snatches of this and that and no one can figure out what is happening. Not even the director of Special Operations, Otto Rencke can get a handle on it using all of his computer prowess. All he can say is that his computers are turning lavender. (not a good thing)

Dragged back from retirement, former Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) is asked to go to Mexico and see if he can piece together what is going on. From there until fairly near the end of the book, the story is best described as plodding and repetitive.

There are intruiging characters. Gloria Ibenez resurfaces from the previous novel, "Allah's Scorpion" (one of his best). Another woman of mystery comes forward to tell her version of events that led to the murder of the CIA agent. There is a mysterious Chinese General by the name of Liu who is loosely attached to the Chinese embassy and who is certainly mixed up in things, but how?

If the point of the story is that the business of espionage is a slow and tedious process, the point is well made as we go from interview to inquiry to discussion to interview again. You sometimes feel as though you already have read a particular chapter as they are often similar.

There is a section of the book where the author describes the post 9/11 world perhaps as well as I have ever seen it done: "Ever since 9/11 a new world order had emerged. It was the same holy war...that had been going on for fifteen centuries. Only this time the soldiers were Muslim radicals, jihadists who were filled with such holy zeal that they were willing to sacrifice their own lives for a cause that most of them could not name, let alone understand."

There is more, but it merely an aside.

What I was left with after finishing the book was the question as to why this book was not the first six chapters of the book that is surely to follow which has great promise as being a spell binder, given the nature of the threat. Hopefully, Hagberg will be up to the challenge when he writes it. This one seems to be mostly treading water to no great purpose.

I love David Hagberg's Kirk McGarvey series. I've read them all and have always waited impatiently for the next installment.I found his latest, DANCE WITH THE DRAGON to be a disappointment.I have always been able to rely on McGarvey for some harrowing adventures and this one just doesn't measure up.The story moves at a snails pace and WAY too much time is devoted to McGarvey sitting in people's apartments and interviewing them.One of these interviews went on for 29 pages!It seems that Hagberg knew he had a weak story and spent too many pages on character background.There were 4 long interview/interrogation sequences in this book that took up about 2/3 of the story.The only real action came in the last 30 pages or so and even that was extremely weak compared with past McGarvey novels.Nothing really happens here. It seems that this entire book is just a set-up for the next McGarvey novel.
The whole "leave me alone, I'm retired," stuff is getting old, too.You know McGarvey is going to take the assignment so Hagberg should just give him a government job and skip all the tired angst. I can do without the worried wife and nosy daughter also.

I kept waiting for the author's usual fast action, but this book seems to be the first part with just the investigative work. There should certainly be a second part more up to the author's usual standards. To sum it up, I felt as if I had read half of a book.

Is this the most boring book ever written? Probably not, but sometimes it certainly did seem like it as I ploughed through. For example, after you've read the sentence " 'What was General Liu really doing in Mexico?' McGarvey wondered" for at least the thirtieth time, you might get my point. Little action, much pseudo-Freudian pontification on men, women, bad men and bad women doing really bad things. In passing I might point out that Hagberg seems to take a rather pessimistic view of the fairer sex, and does rather shove this down your throat, if you'll excuse the pun. All the women here are either weak and malleable, or else psychotic and untrustworthy. A much better book is the one set in North and South Korea.

I love the McGarvey Series, but I agree this was at best half a book. I hope Hagberg is not degenerating like Tom Clancy did. I was reading it and nothing was going on, the pages were dwindling, until nothing left. Left very unsatisfied. McGarvey didn't do anything. not at all like the previous novels. Going to give the series one more chance.

I've read most,if not all, of the Kirk McGarvey series and enjoyed them all. This was certainly no exception. An interesting plot with a number of well developed characters. Of course McGarvey is his usual superlative self. Then come the others. CIA Mexico City station chief Gilbert Perry--well bred,with high ambitions and financial problems. CIA Deputy Director of Operations Howard McCann,relatively minor role but still an obnoxious bureaucrat. Otto Rencke McGarvey's friend and ally. Computer genius. General Liu Hung, Chinese espionage expert operating in Mexico but for who? He's from a wealthy well connected family and has financial issues of his own. He gets his kicks strangling women during sexual acts. He's looking for a huge payoff from a project he's working on. Then comes a beautiful mysterious Iranian woman Shahrzad Shadmand who had performed as a dancer in exotic men's clubs and had an affair with a murdered CIA operative Louis Updegraf who had his own ambitions and personal agenda. Next up is Gloria Ibenez a beautiful Cuban CIA operative in love with McGarvey but another one with her own agenda. Put all these characters together and it gets quite interesting. Rencke's computer programs show great danger to the U.S. McGarvey is brought back from retirement to get to the bottom of things. He discovers a horrendous Hezbollah scheme to cause much carnage and many deaths in the U.S. I found this to be a riveting enjoyable continuation in the series. Though I'm getting a bit tired of McGarvey's constantly coming out of retirement. Maybe it's time for him to forget about retirement even though he's getting older.

Talk, talk, talk, and very little action. The bulk of this book serves only to tell the reader that a) General Liu is a very, very, very bad man, and b) something very, very, very bad is going to happen. I don't think I will spoil the plot for anyone when I say that McGarvey kills Liu (of course he does!). We don't find out what the very very bad thing is until the last three pages of the book. But guess what? It doesn't happen in this book, it happens in the sequel!!

The "meat" of this story could easily condense into a single chapter to start off the sequel. There are pages and pages of inane, repetitive dialog. I think Hagberg has deliberately fluffed up this book so he could sell two books instead of one. But maybe I'm getting ahead of myself; there's no guarantee that he'll finish the story in the sequel! I don't think I'll buy it to find out.

This is another book starring Kirk McGarvey as the hero. This time
instead of Russians and terrorists being the villains you now have the
Chinese in the role of the bad guys. Otto Rencke is sensing all sorts of danger coming at the United States. He is in a panic mode. To add to it a CIA agent named Louis Updegraft is found murdered on the steps of the
U.S. embassy in Mexico. The only link that can be found to this case is
an Iranian belly dancer Named Shahrzad Shadmund. McGarvey is called out of retirement to interview the woman.All signa point to Liu Hung a
general with China. He is a big official in the intelligencr community in China. He is planning a big event in America that could be catasrofic.
McGarvey travels yo Mexico to get to the bottom of the plot. Inch by inch
he discovers the truth behind Liu's plans. He is joined in Mexico by
Gloria Ibenez a character from the last novel. Of course Otto plays his usual role. One complaint I had of this novel was that you did't discover the evil plot until the last 10 pages. Otherwise it was a good book.