Assassination Day : A Peter Ashton Novel (Egleton, Clive)

Rating:
Summary: A distinctly un-thrilling thriller
Review: 376 pages of convolution, an endless parade of characters, plot twists galore - and not very satisfying.

An obnoxious young American woman comes to London to peddle the alleged memoirs of a former British spy. The publisher she is to meet with is murdered by a pair of nasties. Soon enough we are involved with the inner workings of several British police and intelligence agencies, a bunch of terrorists, a turncoat Brit nursing a grudge and the CIA. There is the grizzled old pro, Peter Ashton; the beleaguered director; the wannabes and perky analyst working her way up the ladder.

Not an awful read, but definitely pedestrian. The characters despite the earnest efforts of the author never take on any depth. The plot twists and turns, but not in a way that excites. No sitting on the edge of your seat here. The final scenes are hideously contrived and unbelievable.

In all, an un-thrilling thriller.

Jerry

Rating:
Summary: Falls Short
Review: As is en vogue these days this book is built around a fictional terrorist attack. Mr. Egleton while adroit at building layers of characters and keeping the reader alert was not as accomplished at coming up with a believable story line.

While everyone understands that terrorism is deplorable Mr. Egleton says nothing about motive or rationale for the act of terrorism that the story is built around. He seems to leave it to the reader to understand that terrorist are insane and lack the ability to come up with rational interesting enough for us to want to investigate. And while this may be true it left the villains faceless. In a book like the one Mr. Egleton set out to write the description between the good team and the bad team needs to be balanced so that affinity can be developed for the heroes and hatred or dread can be developed for the enemy. Without this balance the story lacks momentum. We all hate terrorism and terrorists in general but Mr. Egleton gives us no basis for hating these specific terrorist aside from superficial references to their nationality.

One objective, if indeed it was his objective, that Mr. Egleton succeeds at is bringing in a truck load of characters and there by illustrating to the reader that it takes a legion of committed individuals to combat terrorism in the modern world. While this is something positive I will take away from the book the onslaught of characters added to the plodding of the plot and in the end detracted from the reading experience.