Customer Reviews

Greed

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

 

 

I enjoyed Chris Ryan's other novel "The Watchman". It got a little far-fetched at the very end but was a good read overall. Ryan's SAS "tradecraft" contributed markedly to this.

"Greed" is... idiotic. It's almost a put-on of "The Watchman", with (among MANY other defects) an ending that is so stupid that it's incredible. Incredible in and of itself - and also incredible that an author could write such tripe and that a publisher would print it. It features - and I am not making this up - people ambushing people ambushing people ambushing people, with two of those involved coming back from the dead on cue! Except for these over-the-top excesses it is in broad terms exactly the same ending as in "The Watchman"!

But this ending is hardly a let-down, given the inanities that precede it. The entire premise of the plot, as explained to the ex-SAS squad, is so logically flawed that a child would reject it. I simply couldn't believe that I wasn't missing something clever, so I kept reading. But after the first page, it's all downhill.

The characters are alternately hardened, superlatively-trained special forces except when the "plot" demands that they be helpless and hapless fools. Their "emotions" are laughably imagined. The master assassin easily picks off whoever he feels like while the rest of cast mills around in terror. Ryan uses inexcusable authorial misdirection to "fool" the reader into thinking that one character is killed, when he is not. But it's still so obvious that you want to weep. The climactic battle between the hero and the assassin IS NOT EVEN INCLUDED !! The here merely reports later that he waxed the guy!!

Unbelievable. This must be the worst book I have read through in decades. A real stinker. No more Chris Ryan for me!

I want my money back. This is one of the worst books I've ever read. The characters are unlikeable and completely unbelievable. They make one absolutely stupid decision after another. If this is how ex-SAS operate then the British are in worse shape than I thought. The whole motivation of the "hero" is so riduclous that his only real quality is his outright stupidity. I will avoid every other book this guy wrote. Seriously, though, I want my money back.

I took this book with me on a plane and couldn't put it down. The only drawback was that I had nothing to read on the way back. I thought I would be taking breaks in between but I just had to keep reading. Great realistic action and mystery. Overall just great descriptive writing. I'll be getting more books from Chris Ryan!

I can't totally disagree with the other reviewer, this book is certainly not a pageturner and there are some aspects in this book i don't like, but it aint that bad.
The story is not so good, but Ryan knows how to keep the tension high.
this book is certainly NOT one of the best books of mr.Ryan but worth a read.