Customer Reviews

Playing With Cobras

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I haven't read Craig Thomas in a while, but I remember liking some of his other books - Sea Leopard, Firefox Down, Hooded Crow, Lions Den. I don't remember the others but this one really had little mystery. You know the villians and good guys from the outset; after that its just turning pages to see what happens.

This was the 1st "novel" that I ever read. I was in middle school when I read this the 1st time about 12 yrs. ago and I remember loving how the book ended back then. I had to reread again and I found it just as enjoyable the 2nd time around, probably more enjoyable, since I could follow the whole plot this time. Like someone else said, it isn't "classic literature" but it will entertain and it will keep you on the edge of your seat. Especially once the escape through the himilayan mountains with Cass and Hyde 1 step ahead of the Indian army begins

With the close of the cold war, Craig Thomas often used multi-million dollar companies as the villians in his novels published in the '90's as opposed to opposite sides of government. But he's able to use his old formula once more, this time with drug-dealing Indian politicians.

In Delhi, British agent Philip Cass uncovers the drug-dealing plot of VK Sharmar who could be in a position to become the next Prime Minister of India. Nervous of being found out, Sharmar frames Cass of the murder of an Inidan film star Cass is having an affair with, who happens to be Sharmar's wife. After Cass is arrested for the murder, Peter Shelley, now head of SIS after Kenneth Aubrey retied at the end of A Hooded Crow, re-inlistes Patrick Hyde back into the service, who also retired along with Aubrey. Hyde is reluctant to come back, but because Cass helped him out in the events of The Bear's Tears and The Last Raven, he feels he owes his friend the returned favor.

Hyde arrives in India to look into the matter and decides Cass is innocent. But then Sharmar becomes the new Prime Minister. Now untouchable, Shelley has no choice but to tell Hyde to leave the Cass case alone, but Hyde won't have that and desperately tries to clear Cass before it's too late. To make things complicated, Ros, Hyde's girlfriend, gets caught in the middle. Her and Hyde were going to head for Australia after finishing his business in India, but when things get complicated Hyde ends up having to use Ros's help, putting her in great danger in the process.

This is a really great Craig book. And although it's pretty much a by-the-numbers typical thriller, it's very entertaining. Patrick Hyde is one of my favorite of Craig's characters, and this one is the most Hyde-dominated book of the ones he appears in. Really great stuff.

"Playing With Cobras" was one of Craig Thomas's last novels - debuting about 1993. It's fast and is very much a CT novel while also showing signs that the author was tiring of the form that he mastered.

"Playing", set in modern India, centers on Patrick Hyde, former SAS commando and hero of previous Thomas novels. ("Playing" features recurring CT characters, but CT's deft writing keeps you from getting lost, even if you've never read one of his older books.) Having already retired from SAS and from being a behind-the-lines man for MI6, Hyde prepares to leave England for "Oz" with his portly and middle-aged lover, Ros. Unfortunately for them both, Hyde is asked to take one last mission - investigate the situation of Phillip Cass, an MI6 agent in India. Last seen as a small character in "Last Raven", Cass is now under scrutiny of both New Delhi and London when he's implicated in the brutal murder of the Indian PM's beautiful wife. There's no doubt that Cass had been intimate with the beautiful Serena Sharmar, but he denies the murder. Instead, Serena was murdered (and Cass framed) by her husband VK Sharmar and his conniving brother Prakhesh to cover the Sharmars' role as a master heroin trafficker. Hyde is quickly convinced of Cass's innocence - but he's alone in that respect. Serena was worshipped across India - married to a liberal politician, frequent co-star of action movie heroes who appeal to Hindi nationalism. Worse, even the British are unwilling to consider Cass's story - because it would antagonize Sharmar's allies in India's progressive Congress party - consequently weakening its anti-nationalist goals (disengagement from Kashmir; peace with Pakistan) and handing India over to the rabidly nationalistic and anti-secular BJP party. (That's my take from the novel - "The Rotten Review" professes no reasonable perspective on Indo-Pak politics.) When the Sharmars kidnap Cass from prison, because it would be easier for everybody if he just disappears, Hyde springs into action - jumping over the heads of fellow Brits and the Indians at the same time. Thomas brings the action to a climax with one of his trademark massive-manhunts, using the lushness of India, the remoteness of Pakistan and the glacial hell of the Afghan border to utterly consume his characters. Few if any writers have captured as sublimely the tension of being at the center of a huge, cross-border manhunt as Craig Thomas has. It's "Firefox" on the ground - and it works as unlikely as it sounds.

Unfortunately, "Playing" gets too little of the Craig Thomas formula - going on too long before the big-hunt part of the book even kicks off. Until then it's a story about crooked Indian politicians - one whose conspiracies haven't aroused much interest among the British. Much of the story seems forced - Hyde's believing Cass, suspicion falling on the Sharmars, London getting ready to toss Cass to the wolves - without substance justifying it. We know the Sharmar's are bad...because the book tells us so (and not as is traditional in CT novels, because characters have enough depth to learn it themselves). The story seems rushed - more like "A Different War" than "Snow Falcon" or the other Mitchell Gant books. It rewards CT fans, but is not a great book for first time CT readers.

This a great tape for driving. The action is fast paced, the images exotic and the characters are interesting. The plot revolved around the escape of an Australian who is being framed for the murder of the Indian Prime Minister's wife. Fans of the Paul Scott's The Raj Quartet will enjoy the houseboat scenes in Kashmir.

The author narrates the book very well, which is sometimes not the case when authors are recorded. He's English -- an accent which I love...

This is not a chef d'oeuvre of litterature, but one will get glued to it very rapidly. The plot and action will thrill any reader with a sense for adventure and foreign and unknown countries. A book to take in the suburb or train or other noisy places, no problems of concentration, the difficulty is to extract oneself from it...