Firewall

Firewall is the third of former SAS man, Andy McNab's Nick Stone book and tts a decent enough thriller. As with the other Stone thrillers, all stories are written sequentially. So due to back story involved, I'd try to read them in the the order they were written.

Like all McNab novels, Firewall is filled with lots of authentic trade craft and attention to technical detail. Here the action is sent in a cold and wintry landscape. This gives rise to sub-zero life-death snowstorm battles with one set-piece following another. Stone dominates the action in this story. He zig-zags from one ‘job /situation gone wrong' to another. Clinging onto life while trying to earn some cash in the process. As with the other books in the series, Nick Stone is a fallible human. And while Stone always survives the story itself is wide open. McNab writes about what he knows, so, while computers feature, this isn't a techno-thriller. Rather they are simply a motive for the bad guys. Lots of bomb-making, bad guy face punching, explosions, loud bangs and shoot-outs. Building to an inevitable man versus the weather climax at the end.

In this book we get a supporting character called Tom. McNab fleshes him out as a believable and likable person. The author also does fairly well in his descriptions of the bleak landscape and people who live in it. However, the child, Kelly, that Stone is looking after felt like a distraction to the main plot.

Recommended for lovers of fairly realistic Special Forces thrillers. Men who use their training as that are not super heroes.