Crisis Four

Crisis Four is McNab's second book in his Nick Stone series. Written in the first person, the tale sees British Intelligence engaging Stone for a covert mission. Stone must use his intelligence and ruthless skills built up as an EX-SAS trooper. He must find and kill Sarah, a renegade agent. Nick hunts Sarah down in the wilderness of America. He soon finds himself involved in a scheme masterminded by Osama bin Laden. He is targeting U.S. President Bill Clinton, Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu, and Palestinian Leader Yassir Arafat while the three leaders are going to be in Washington for a peace summit. Nick is no more than a few days in on his mission that he is smack in the middle of a cat and mouse game that can only turn deadly. So far, so good. But this tale takes a while to get going. Why? Because McNab wants to describe to the reader that he is an expert in the craft of special operations, survival and combat secrets. He learnt these from his years in the services. This military knowledge, shared at great length, gives detailed explanation behind every action, tactics, types of ammunition, etc. The effect is that it slows the story pace and reduces the excitement. McNab devotes many pages, for example, to building an OP in a bush and living there for days on end. Also, if you expect great characterization in a story, you'll be disappointed. Plus the actions of the characters are not particularly credible especially towards the conclusion. But again this is fiction written for entertainment. It's worth reading the first Nick Stone novel, [b:Remote Control 601621 Remote Control (Nick Stone, #1) Andy McNab https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1331761961s/601621.jpg 1778822]. While each novel stands alone just fine, the first novel provides a useful introduction to this one.I thought that the ending had a nice twist, which I won't spoil here. So, all in all, a decent thriller, lots of suspense and action, slowed down by excessive details (in my opinion).