Kill Shot: An American Assassin Thriller (Mitch Rapp) [Kindle Edition]

Vince Flynn (Author)

Book Description

#1 internationally bestselling author Vince Flynn delivers the young, hungry, and lethal Mitch Rapp at the onset of his career as a CIA superagent.

In the year since the CIA trained and then unleashed him, Mitch Rapp has been steadily working his way through a list of men, bullet by bullet. With each swift and untraceable kill, the tangled network of monsters responsible for the slaughter of 270 civilians in the Pan Am Lockerbie attack become increasingly aware that someone is hunting them. Rapp is given his next target, and finds the man asleep in his bed in Paris. In the split second it takes the bullet to leave Rapp’s silenced pistol, the trap is sprung and he finds himself in the fight of his life.

     The next morning, nine bodies are discovered in one of Paris’s finest hotels—among them the Libyan oil minister. Back in Washington the finger-pointing begins in earnest as no one wants any part in what has become an international crisis and potential embarrassment for the CIA. Rapp’s handlers have only one choice—deny any responsibility for the incident and pray that their newest secret weapon stays that way.

     Rapp must avoid capture or die quietly. One person in the group, however, is not prone to leaving such important things to chance. Rapp has become a liability, and Stan Hurley will not allow Rapp to be taken alive by the French authorities, even if it means killing him. Operating on his own and outside the control of his handlers, it will soon become clear that nothing is more dangerous than a wounded and cornered Mitch Rapp.

     In Flynn’s newest page-turner, the stakes are higher than they’ve ever been as Mitch Rapp embarks on the journey that will turn him into America’s most deadly asset. The nonstop action in this shockingly realistic political thriller will keep your pulse pounding till the very end.

Editorial Reviews

Review

“The voice of today’s postmodern thriller generation, Flynn has never been better.” --Providence Journal

“There’s a reason [Vince Flynn] is No. 1 on the bestseller list." --The New York Post

“Flynn is a master -- maybe the master -- of writing thriller novels in which the pages seem to turn themselves.” --Bookreporter.com

Review

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Product Details

• File Size: 1124 KB
• Print Length: 464 pages
• Publisher: Atria/Emily Bestler Books (February 7, 2012)
• Sold by: Simon and Schuster Digital Sales Inc
• Language: English
• ASIN: B004V3WT6K
• Text-to-Speech: Not enabled
• X-Ray: Enabled
• Lending: Not Enabled
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #576 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
  • #9 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Genre Fiction > Political
  • #12 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Genre Fiction > Political
  • #93 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Contemporary

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

134 of 151 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Vintage Flynn. February 7, 2012

By MED TOP 1000 REVIEWER

Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase

Kill Shot is the sequel to American Assassin, which itself was a prequel to the long running series featuring Mitch Rapp. This book contines the story of Rapp's development as an asset for the CIA. He has spent his first year "running solo" - infiltrating the world's terror cells and killing with purpose. The spree has not gone unnoticed and elements of the terrorist networks want the killing to stop.

The turning point is an attempt on a Libyan diplomat in Paris. The kill goes all wrong and Rapp must fight his way out - leaving behind carnage and a mess that needs accountability - from someone. Rapp is unwilling to trust his fellow spies at the CIA and his longtime nemesis, Stan Hurley, uses this to target Rapp as a problem that needs to be eliminated.

Flynn deftly tells his story, even though longtime readers can discern some of the outcome just by having read "future" installments. I did not know how he was going to weave a taut thriller with so much of the story having been already written - but he manages superbly. Flynn layers the past artfully, giving us pieces of the history that will make Rapp lethal.

The stand alone story within this prequel is full of duplicity and the reader must decide what is justified and how often does the official story deviate from the truth? But it is clear why Rapp forges his own moral code and trusts so few.

120 of 136 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Oh my my... February 7, 2012

By Jason Frost TOP 1000 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover

Want to have a fun conversation? Walk up to someone reading this book and ask them if this is the 12th or 2nd book in the series. Whatever answer they choose, you give the opposite. Prepare to duck and run. I have been a fan of Vince Flynn ever since his books stumbled into my life about three years ago. Even if he was to write a book about growing horse toenails in Fishhook, Alaska, I would still read it. Thank the lord Jesus, however, this book is nothing like that!

Vince brings back the young Mitch Rapp in a book that ought to come with a prescription for Niacin. Why? You'll need something to counter the adrenaline. If you've had the pleasure of reading about Mitch, you know that he is a "man's man" and has absolutely NO tolerance for BS and bad guys. And that is when he was... "Mature". Can you imagine this killing machine in his younger years? Can you imagine a weapon with the body of Greek sculpture, a mind as sharp as Tesla, and the natural killing instinct of a Megalodon? You can if you know Mitch Rapp.

Mitch has completed his training and has been let loose on the unsuspecting world. He is a tsunami of pure destruction. Precise destruction. The only thing he leaves in his wake is the bodies of dead terrorists. A-MEN! Unfortunately, with this type of success, from a rookie no doubt, there starts to fester some resentment and jealously. And not only with our enemies. Hurley and Victor have their personal reasons for not liking Mitch, but will it interfere with the #1 objective... to keep America safe?

This mission finds Mitch in Paris and he has graciously exploded the head of some well deserving terrorist filth when the tables are turned. Our boy has been set up... and set up good.... The ensuing firefight leaves more blood on the floor than an exploding vampire. Unfortunately Mitch gets wounded. And a wounded Mitch Rapp is a pissed Mitch Rapp. And a pissed Mitch Rapp is a deadly Mitch Rapp (see above Megalodon reference). Thus ensues a cat and mouse maze that Flynn's fan has come to expect as one of the BEST in the game.

Scientist dream about going back in time and witnessing the "big bang". Witnessing the unimaginable explosion that started it all. That's the perfect analogy to explain what it's like reading about the young Mitch. Powerful. Destructive. Unrelenting. Violent. Violent. Violent. Just the way it ought to be. Read more ›

An Amazon.com official commented on the review below

141 of 172 people found the following review helpful

2.0 out of 5 stars Kill Shot: Not his best work February 9, 2012

By G. Shyu

Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase

I was a little hesitant to purchase this due to the less than stellar reviews but Flynn's previous entry in the series, "American Assassin" also received mixed reviews and was very enjoyable so I took the plunge. Unfortunately, not only is most of this book mediocre, I felt cheated on the price. Don't be fooled by the length of the book - the story ends at 72% in. The rest of the 28% is excerpts from every other Vince Flynn book. The end result is a book I was able to finish in a few hours. I definitely expected more bang for my buck and feel cheated by the publisher and author.

As a previous reviewer stated, the plot was less than riveting and some parts of the plot just seem contrived and predictable because the author was at a loss how to move the story forward. The ending was rushed and abruptly dropped the entire story leaving me with a "that's it?" feeling. It feels like the Mitch Rapp series has met it's end and I will probably not be buying the next book unless it has stellar reviews.

An Amazon.com official commented on this review (What's this?)

Kindle Content Quality saysMarch 2, 2012

Based on customer feedback, we have worked with the author and publisher to make available a new version of this book. You can get this new version by going to the Manage Your Kindle page at http://amazon.com/MYKupdate. Find the book in your Kindle Library and click on the "update available" link next to the book's title. Within 5 minutes, any of your devices that have the eBook currently downloaded and have an active wireless connection will be updated automatically.

Please take a moment to read the following letter from Vince Flynn:

Dear Mitch Rapp fans,

I would like to apologize for some of the confusion that occurred for those of you who read Kill Shot in the digital format. We thought readers would enjoy being able to read excerpts from all of my backlist, but as it turns out, we've heard otherwise from many of you.

All of this free material was counted as part of the book and led readers to believe they still have 29% of the book left to read when in fact Kill Shot has just ended. Managing your expectations is something I take very seriously, and I understand your frustration. If I was on a plane and I thought I was only two thirds of the way through a book and it abruptly ended I would be very disappointed.

We heard you and we fixed this. I appreciate your patience on the matter and I apologize for any disappointment or frustration that it has caused.

Sincerely,
Vince Flynn

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful

1.0 out of 5 stars I want my money back! March 5, 2012

By mtgman

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

Dear Mr. Flynn,
Please take a couple of years off and put some gas in the writing tank this story was written on empty! Let me give you a helpful example, you wrote about everyone's back story as if you hadn't wrote about any of the characters before when all you had to do was put an asterisk by their name and let the reader go to the back of the book if they want to know more about that person instead of writing page upon page of story line about these characters that amounted to nothing. I was in Mexico and had downloaded this book on my e-reader before I left (I had pre-ordered it months ago) and could not buy another one there so I was stuck reading one of the worst books I have read in a long time. If Amazon had a return policy on down loaded books I would ask for a refund because this book sucks and I know a good one from a mediocre to a bad one because I have read a book every couple of weeks for the last 20 plus years. A flash back story line REALLY? That's all you got? I will never buy another one of your books until I have read at least 20 plus reviews on Amazon first you can get me once but not twice.

More About the Author

The fifth of seven children, Vince Flynn was born in St. Paul, Minnesota, in 1966. He graduated from the St. Thomas Academy in 1984, and the University of St. Thomas with a degree in economics in 1988.

After college he went to work for Kraft General Foods where he was an account and sales marketing specialist.

In 1990 he left Kraft to accept an aviation candidate slot with the United States Marine Corps. One week before leaving for Officers Candidate School, he was medically disqualified from the Marine Aviation Program, due to several concussions and convulsive seizures he suffered growing up. While trying to obtain a medical waiver for his condition, he started thinking about writing a book. This was a very unusual choice for Flynn since he had been diagnosed with dyslexia in grade school and had struggled with reading and writing all his life.

Having been stymied by the Marine Corps, Flynn returned to the nine-to-five grind and took a job with United Properties, a commercial real estate company in the Twin Cities. During his spare time he worked on an idea he had for a book. After two years with United Properties he decided to take a big gamble. He quit his job, moved to Colorado, and began working full time on what would eventually become Term Limits.

Like many struggling artists before him, he bartended at night and wrote during the day. Five years and more than sixty rejection letters later he took the unusual step of self-publishing his first novel. The book went to number one in the Twin Cities, and within a week had a new agent and two-book deal with Pocket Books, a Simon & Schuster imprint.

Term Limits hit the New York Times bestseller list in paperback and started a trend for all of Flynn's novels. Since then, his books have become perennial bestsellers in both paperback and hardcover, and he has become known for his research and prescient warnings about the rise of Islamic Radical Fundamentalism and terrorism. Read by current and former presidents, foreign heads of state, and intelligence professionals around the world, Flynn's novels are taken so seriously one high-ranking CIA official told his people, "I want you to read Flynn's books and start thinking about how we can more effectively wage this war on terror."

October 2007 marked another milestone in Flynn's career when his ninth political thriller, Protect and Defend, became a #1 New York Times bestseller. A few months later, CBS Films optioned the rights for Flynn's Mitch Rapp character with the intention of creating a character-based, action-thriller movie franchise. Lorenzo di Bonaventura, who previously launched the Harry Potter and Matrix films as head of production at Warner Bros., and Nick Wechsler (We Own the Night, Reservation Road) will produce the films.

Flynn's 10th hardcover, Extreme Measures, was published in October 2008. It was also a #1 New York Times bestseller. His most recent novel, Kill Shot, was published in Fenbruary 2012.

The Mitch Rapp story begins with American Assassin, followed by Kill Shot Transfer of Power, The Third Option, Separation of Power, Executive Power, Memorial Day, Consent to Kill, Act of Treason, Protect and Defend, Extreme Measures and Pursuit of Honor.

Influences: Ernest Hemingway, Robert Ludlum, Tom Clancy, J.R.R. Tolkien, Gore Vidal, and John Irving. Flynn lives in the Twin Cities with his wife and three children.

Amazon Author Rankbeta 

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#68 Overall (See top 100 authors)

#11 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Contemporary

#16 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Genre Fiction

#20 in Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Contemporary Fiction

#21 in Books > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers

#22 in Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Mystery & Thrillers > Thrillers

#11 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Contemporary

#16 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Genre Fiction

#20 in Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Contemporary Fiction

#21 in Books > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers

#22 in Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Mystery & Thrillers > Thrillers