Dead Hand

This book didn't have the same amount of military action as other Coyle novels like "Team Yankee" or "Sword Point," but with all the great characters it didn't matter. One of my favorites had to be Sergeant-Chef Stanislaus Dombrowski of the French Foreign Legion. He provided a great insight into the kind of brotherhood formed among troops in elite units. I also really liked Russian commando Colonel Demetre Orlov. He's what I would call subtly ruthless and loyal to the State, until he's ordered to go after the General in charge of the Perimeter missiles about to go off due to an asteroid strike in Siberia. Toward the end of the book Orlov is seriously confused as to what his course of action should be.Coyle did an excellent job fleshing out all his characters. Some of his descriptions of the devastation caused by the asteroid and the harsh conditions the NATO special ops units must face were pretty good. Not too many combat scenes, but Coyle made up for it at the end with a rollercoaster ride of a battle at the last Perimeter silo. The epilogue where one SAS officer gives his view on duty to one's country perfectly summed up the theme of this book.Coyle has proven that he has grown as a writer. Quite frankly, I think some of his characters in "Dead Hand" were better than Colonel Scott Dixon and company in previous novels. Bully for Mr. Coyle and "Dead Hand."

AS USUAL, COYLE COMES THROUGH. GOOD PREMISE AND USUALLY FAST PACED. AN INTERESTING READ.

As a big military novel fan, Harold Coyle is one of my favorite authors. No one captures the individual emotionality of going to war -- the apprehension, the camaraderie, the burdens of leadership, and the hardships of combat -- better than Harold Coyle.Mr. Coyle's novels usually highlight a specific theater of operations, be it Iran (Sword Point), Egypt (Bright Star), the Civil War (Savage Wilderness and Until the End, which, incidentally, are two of his best), Columbia (Code of Honor), Mexico (Trial By Fire), or, more recently, Slovakia (God's Children), rather than playing on a world stage, like say a Tom Clancy.In his effort to feature elite troops from the British SAS, the French Foreign Legion and the American Special Forces Group, and to pit them against experienced Russian commandos, Mr. Coyle attempts one of his most ambitious works to-date.The international premise, and its establishment in the first half of the novel, unfortunately, is highly implausible. Without divulging all of the specifics, let's just say it involves an asteroid hitting the earth and a rogue Russian general using this natural catastrophe to leverage his regional nuclear weapons to blackmail Moscow and the West. The regional commandeering of the missiles is made possible by a secret doomsday mechanism (code named Dead Hand, and reminiscent of the doomsday device in the movie classic, Dr. Strangelove), which is triggered coincidentally by the errant meterorite.Fortunately, Mr. Coyle's emotional description of battle is without peer, and true fans of his will find the second half of the book as riveting as any of his earlier works.Mr. Coyle's story, on a geopolitical plane, doesn't achieve the level of intrigue and complexity of a Tom Clancy novel. But even Tom Clancy doesn't capture the emotional view from the field as well as Harold Coyle. Mr. Coyle's novels aren't just about war and conflict; they are about personal sacrifices made for the accomplishment of a greater goal (which is, of course, a great metaphor for life in general and why his books are so meaningful).If you'd like to experience the timeless and universal anguish and elation felt by all men and women (combatants) in war; and if you'd like to believe that there are causes in this world more noble than those faced by most of us in our everyday lives, Harold Coyle's Dead Hand is a very satisfying read. I enjoyed it immensely.

Many writers who acheive success seem to shrink and rely on increasingly tired formulae. Not Harold Coyle. His mastery of the craft continues to grow. "Dead Hand" turned out to be a two-night read. If I didn't have a deadline project to deal with, it would have been read in a single night. The plot spans the globe. His use of an extraordinary device sounds and feels plausible. He manages to imbue eight (8!) major characters with lives of their own, in addition to a slew of minor characters, passing through and adding credence to the story. The combat, necessarily, is not on a grand scale. Rather the main conflict is between small, highly-trained and very deadly commando and special forces teams. The conclusion is what it should be: small steps lead to intense combat and believable heroic acts by friend and foe alike. The one-page epilogue compels you think about the sacrifices made by so many unheralded warriors to preserve or acheive freedom. Reading this novel provides the same thrill as first readings of Clancy and Ludlum, before they became "production line" writers. If you enjoy combat thrillers laced with global politics, "Dead Hand" will provide you with a fine, exciting experience. Jerry