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Area 7 - Matthew Reilly (Audio Download)
by Neo420
Area 7 by Matthew Reilly
== Plot ==
This is the second novel in the Shane Scofield aka Scarecrow series. Scarecrow is a uS marine. He is known as Scarecrow because he has a vertical scar running down across each eye which is why he likes to wear cool sunglasses when killing people.
Basically, what plot there ... is, goes something like this, after his last adventure in the novel, Icestation, the Marine Core decide to assign Shane Scofield to presidential protection duty, so the media can't get access to him. He ends up protecting the president when he travels on the marine helicopter, Marine 1.
They make a routine visit to a remote top secret air force base, (Area 7). Things go off track when an air force general takes control of the base and the soldiers inside mutiny. Scarecrow and his team of Marines must keep the president alive while fighting off multiple enemy forces . . .
I read that one of the author's favourite movies is Die Hard and it is sort of like that. It has elements of the movie Speed as well, in that if the presidents heart stops, then multiple nuclear warheads placed strategically around the US will explode simultaneously.
I'm not giving any spoilers as this is all mentioned right at the start of the novel. The rest of the time is spent with Scarecrow and his team fending off attackers from all sides, and dispatching them in ingenious ways.
== My Thoughts ==
You don't really need to read the first novel in this series to get into this. There isn't much in the way of character development. The author has kept the same elements of the first novel, Icestation and just juggled things around like changing the location from a remote ice station to a remote airbase and enemies. The only difference is that this time the action has been notched up an octave and is more intense and over the top.
I enjoyed it while I was reading it. However, thinking about it now, the plot has a few major potholes. It is weaker when compared to Icestation. It is too elaborate especially the bit to do with the nuclear warheads. The author still manages to throw in enough twists and new enemies as the novel goes along, to keep you distracted.
The first part of the novel sets up the scene and characters, but there is tons of action once it starts. The main enemy Scarecrow and his friends have to face are about 50 or so crack air force commandos, but several other rogue and unexpected foes, make an appearance to ruin their day. This includes agents from other countries and even animals. Being an air base, there are advanced aircraft lying around along with various weapons for the good guys to play with.
I would say hundreds of baddies are killed by the end. One seems to be knocked off every few paragraphs and after a while I lost count. I liked the complex and long action sequences. My favourite one is when both the good and bad guys are racing through a maze-like series of canyons with helicopters. The kinds of stunts they do are something you would expect to see in an action movie and not in real life. That is fine with me. I didn't think it went too overboard. Apart from one section where the hero, Scarecrow manages to fly into space. It reminded me of the movie Moonraker, one of the James Bond movies. The way the author describes it and the way he actually gets there, it doesn't seem implausible, but it still didn't feel like it fitted into the rest of the story well.
Saying all that,I prefer escapist type novels which this is.
The writing style can be a bit simplistic at times. The author likes using words like suddenly, huge and gigantic a lot. In this case, they make the action sequences flow more naturally.
== Audio Narration ==
The audio book version is produced by Balinda Audio and the guy reading it is Sean Mangan. I'm not sure about his accent. I think it is American. He does have quite a deep voice and he doesn't add much colour / variety to the different characters voices and story, by changing his tone or inflection when speaking. The only reason I kept listening to him was because I enjoyed the novel and I could ignore his annoying voice. I don't manage to do that normally if I don't like the voice of the narrator.
The runtime of this is just under 12 hours (716 mins to be precise).
== Summary and recommendation ==
I have listened to this multiple times. Even though some people may consider it stupid, silly and the plot may be over the top, I still have found it fun, while listening to it. It keeps my attention all the way through, and I am never bored. I therefore, give it 4 stars. Not as good as Icestation, but still worth reading, if you like some light-hearted entertainment.
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Ice Station (Audio Book) - Matthew Reilly
by Neo420
Icestation by Matthew Reilly
== Plot ==
This is the first book in the Shane Scofield / Scarecrow series. The story revolves around an American underground research station in Antarctica called Wilks ice station. At the start of the book, two divers are undertaking a routine dive when they lose radio contact with ... the station. More divers are sent down after them, but they discover what appears to be a spaceship buried deep underneath the research station. They are then attacked by unknown creatures.
The remaining crew in the station send out a distress message on all radio frequencies which is picked up by both friends and enemies alike.
Lieutenant Shane Scofield call sign Scarecrow is sent along with the rest of his 11-man unit of Marine Recons to the station to secure the spaceship and provide assistance. (The Marine Recons are part of US Special Forces.)
By the time they reach the research station, the weather conditions have deteriorated and a solar flare disrupts all radio communication, meaning they are cut off from the outside world.
This all happens in the first part of the novel and is just the intro. There's lots of non-stop action for the rest of the story as they fend off enemies from all sides who want the spaceship for themselves . . .
== My review ==
When I initially read the prolog, I was thinking this would have a lot of sci-fi type stuff going on, with the mention of the spaceship, but fortunately, there aren't many sci-fi elements in the main part of the book.
This is one of the few novels I have reread several times over the past few years. I enjoyed it immensely. In most of the novels I read, there'll only be 1 or 2 set piece action sequences somewhere near the end. However, once it starts, there is non-stop action in this. It reminded me of the cheesy 80's action movies I used to watch. Some people may find it over the top but I didn't think it was. I thought it was well planned out and choreographed. Various weapons are used including machine guns, crossbows, grappling hooks and grenades, which keeps the action fresh. The author explains each weapon in basic terms, so you know what damage it can do without going into the technical details. The body count in this is close to over a hundred deaths. There is quite a bit of swearing, especially the f*** and s*** words, once the shooting starts, but I think it is used appropriately, and I didn't find it vulgar. I found it funny rather than anything else.
I thought it had a fun, light hearted tone. The plot is well crafted and intricate. It is believable in comparison to the latter books in this series where the action overtakes the story. There are enough twists throughout to keep you hooked. There's also a conspiracy related subplot that was well written and weaved into the narrative. It gripped my attention all the way through as there was something new happening every few seconds. Also, I've read books by other authors who are supposed to write action novels like Andy McNab and compared to that this is way better. Normally, you only have 1 or two villains at most but here there are multiple, sprinkled throughout the book.
The author writes in a simple easy to read style. Some parts of it read like a movie in particular, the action sequences. Every time I reread it, I pick up on something I missed the last time, as there is so much going on. The third person narrative style that this is written in also helps. He has a habit of frequently using phrases like 'his eyes opened wide' and 'suddenly', along with cliff-hangers, so in one scene a character may fall off a 50ft ledge and you think uh oh. But, then in the next section they usually manage to survive through good luck or by using one of their weapons. It is not something I have come across before in many books, and it works well to build tension and to make you want the characters to survive.
My favourite character has to be Shane Scofield aka Scarecrow. He is the hero and the leader of the Marine Recon force. He reminded me a bit of the Terminator. He always wears tinted sunglasses, plus no matter how much he gets flung around, he still comes back for more.
The other characters are also well sketched out and colourful.
== Audio Narration ==
The audio book I listened to was narrated by Sean Mangan. I am not a big fan of his. He has a deep voice and his line delivery was quite wooden. He doesn't change his tone of voice much throughout the book. I think his voice is suited to the action sequences where the toneless quality helps to make it more entertaining. When doing dialog or any emotional parts, he performs poorly in my opinion.
The approximate runtime of this is just over 15 hours. It sounds long but when listening to the book, it flys by.
== Summary and recommendation ==
I am giving this 5 stars. Even though I thought the audio narration could have been better, I found the novel itself extremely enjoyable. If you are fans of Ian Flemming and Robert Ludlan or cheesy action movies like Commando and Die Hard then you'll like this. It has some strong language and violence so I'd say it was suitable for teenagers and older.
It has all the ingredients I like in a novel - large amounts of action, a dollop of conspiracy, drama and a pinch of comedy. It was fun and entertaining and it kept me gripped all the way through.
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The Fireman (Audio Book) - Stephen Leather
by Neo420
The Fireman by Stephen Leather
== Plot ==
This is the second book in the Bangkok Bob series. The plot revolves around an unnamed and cynical crime journalist. He is an alcoholic who is trying to stop but finding it difficult and who is past his prime. He narrates the story from his point of view.
At the start ... of the novel, he finds out his sister Sally, has committed suicide by jumping out of the 15th floor of a sky rise. He doesn't think his sister would commit suicide and he travels over to Hong Kong to find out the truth and to seek revenge.
This is written before 1997, when Hong Kong was in British hands. I'd say this was set in 1989 or there's about.
== Review ==
Leather has worked as a journalist in Hong Kong and you can tell that from the way he describes the city. I felt I could picture it in my mind.
However, I believe this is one of his earlier books and it shows. It is not as good as most of his other books. He's trying to create a detective story with a wise cracking hero. The only thing he changes is to put in a journalist as the main person instead of a PI. The journalist himself is quite a cynical / jaded person and the story is told as if he were narrating the story. If I were to meet him in real life, I would say he was a bit of a pr*ck.
He does make some funny observations about life and people in general throughout the book which did make me smile. Though, there wasn't much in the way of a plot.
There was one shocking secret to do with the brother and his sister mentioned half way through the book, which ruined any enjoyment I may have had. The author just mentions it and then skips over it never mentioning it again. It kept bugging me right through to the end of the book. I don't consider it a plot spoiler as it is never mentioned again. It felt like it'd been put in by mistake - There was some mention of incest out of nowhere. The only thing this made me do was to dislike the main character. Up till then, I was thinking he may be an ok guy.
I felt most of the book was spent wasting time with the character wandering about Hong Kong randomly. He doesn't find the bad guys himself; it is with the help of someone else in Hong Kong. The story picks up about three quarters of the way through. I worked out who the bad guy was as soon as he mentioned them. There aren't that many characters in the book which doesn't make it very hard to guess.
== Audio narration ==
I listened to the audio book version and it was narrated by Paul Thornley. He did a good job voicing the different characters, and changing his tone of voice when saying something witty / funny. I didn't find him annoying which is the main thing. He managed to do the different accents for the Chinese, American and British characters allowing me to tell who was who while listening to the book.
The approximate runtime for this audio book is 9 Hours 45 Mins. It felt much longer than that to me.
The cheapest place I could find this was at Audable (http://www.audible.co.uk/)
== Summary and recommendation ==
I can't recommend this. The plot is standard fair - like a standard 80's revenge action movie without the action. You know there's going to be some killing but you don't really care by the end.
The author has used aspects of this book in another up to date series of novels in which the main guy (Jack Nightingale), is a private detective but it also has a bit of the occult. The first story in the series is called Nightfall, and in that there you have someone jumping off a high building. I would recommend you pick that up and give this a miss.
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