Customer Reviews

Exit Strategy

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

If you enjoy fast-paced action, sharp dialogue, and a brainy heroine who can deal serious bodily injury, pick this up. Opens with an Internet startup firm specializing in cryptography getting brutally shot up in broad daylight by a hit team disguised as postmen--but two eyewitnesses survive. Suspected by the police, the FBI, and the general public, they desperately try to stay ahead of the multiple shadowy teams trying to kill them--and figure out what's going on. The multiple plot twists and close calls will keep you turning the pages. I literally could not put it down. If you're like me, you will be tempted to read the ending about halfway through, BUT DON'T DO IT. I assure you that the conclusion is VERY satisfying. Highly recommended.

This story takes place in San Francisco.The hero of this book
is Molly Gannon.She is a former MP who is now a postal employee.
An assault takes place while Gannon is delivering mail to
Blindside Corporation.Blindside is a high tech company dealing
in computor espionage,encryption,and code breaking.As a result of the assault eight employees are killed.Every computor in the
business is incinerated leaving no information.Gannon is abducted but finally escapes.Another survivor of the invasion is
Jeb Picot an expert hacker who has served time for previous hacking exploits.An attempt is made to kill Picot on the steps of the police station but Gannon rescues him.As a result Gannon
and Picot become the primary suspects in the Blindside killings.
This becomes a nationwide crime story.A Task Force headed by FBI agent Scott Norcross is created to get to the bottom of the killings.They discover many suspects in the case.Besides Gannon and Picot there is Wo Han Mok a Chinese triad and Dunshire a
NSA(National Security Agency)group who was buying Blindside.This
turns into an interesting book that will keep you guessing.

Very fast paced. Excellent charactor development. Great read (from someone that reads a novel a week). I highly recommend it for those that like faced paced books. I hope it sells as I would like to see more from this author.

Exit Strategy is easily one of the most engaging, intelligent thrillers I've read in quite some time. The book gets off to a roaring start with a brash daylight assault on an internet company called Blindside that leaves eight people dead and the office destroyed. The killers, dressed as postal workers, unfortunately make the mistake of leaving two witnesses: Molly Gannon, a real postal worker (and former Military Police officer) who was in the building on her delivery route, and Blindside employee Jeb Picot, who was in the building, but out of the office, at the time of the assault.

Given that the killers were dressed as postal workers the police suspect Molly of having been in on the attack, and Jeb's convenient absence from the office at the crucial moment raises the authorities' suspicions about his possible involvement as well. Their suspicions are fueled by misinformation and half-truths strategically leaked to them by Dunshire Capitol, a front company for the National Security Agency.

Blindside, it turns out, specialized in cryptography and had made a monumental breakthrough in technology, which Dunshire desperately wants, that is able to crack supposedly uncrackable codes. Further complicating the mix is that Blindside was funded by an organization with ties to a Chinese triad, and now they and Dunshire both want to get their hands on Molly and Jeb, whom they believe have a laptop which contains crucial information.

So many players and competing interests in one storyline could be unwieldy in the hands of some authors, but Wiecek does a masterful job weaving everyone into the flow of the story without slowing things down when switching perspectives or making caricatures out of any faction. All the characters, good guys and bad guys alike, are intelligent and driven by clear, logical motivations. Wiecek also deftly intersperses plenty of cool tech speak throughout the story; if you know computers and coding you'll love it, and if you don't you'll love learning about it. Just don't start unless you have time to finish, because you won't be able to put it down.

I just finished reading this book last night and would recommend this book. The characters have a past and the author does a good job fleshing out their backgrounds and motivations. The descriptions of San Francisco are good and the story, for an action / adventure novel, is plausible enough. I don't think you'd go wrong with this one.

Wish he would publish something else. There's a lot of USPS lore in the story, and the guys has some pretty good insight into federal LE agencies and their perceived pecking order.

In the face of all these other reviews, how can I say "unmemorable?" Well, I read this book about 3 months ago, and honestly, I don't recall much about it. It's not even that I read a lot of books in a similar genre in the lasxt 3 months. It wasn't bad, or I'd remember that. It wasn't great, or I'd remember that. The story worked alright, but honestly, if you are looking for that exciting read, there are better and worse options out there. This was just not exceptional.

while not a classic of american literature it sure is a standout in it's genre. Great, quick read very entertaining. This is a great book for a trip or a lazy day off. While it does rehash several plots form recent movies and books, it still manages to come off as original. The charachters are believable and have enough of a back story to bring you up to speed without boring you to tears.

It's a "chase" thriller, in the manner of Ludlum and others. Bad guys just keep trying to kill our heroes. Naturally, a fair amount of "suspension of disbelief" is required, as computer nerd taps into every system on the planet, as well as performing Eval Knieval tricks on a bike. Those features didn't bother me - in fact, I enjoyed them. What did bother me was the dumb behavior of all characters that was required to keep the plot in motion -- the conviction of the fleeing heroes that they should not speak to anyone anywhere in government and the equally groundless conviction of all branches of law enforcement that our heroes were criminals. Other than that, a fun ride.

Good Book. Some rough spots, but overall a worthy effort.