Patriot Acts (Atticus Kodiak)

The sixth chapter in the Atticus Kodiak series is, in a word, outstanding. The plot is intriguing, and the most overtly political of the Kodiak series, with the bad guy a Washingtonian Rove-Cheney mashup tying into the work of military "contractors"/mercenaries - topical, if nothing else. But it's the character beats that always stick out and make the work exceptional. Some will decry the "sudden" changes in Kodiak or the direction the character goes. Belying the fact that the "sudden" changes took the entire last book in the Kodiak series - Critical Space - one of the things that I've always dug about Rucka's writing is that he allows his characters to make horrible personal and professional choices - just like real people - and deal with the consequences, rationalizing and fighting through their decisions all the while. But I'd disagree with the concept that he's a completely different character now. Everything Kodiak does in this book, in his own twisted way, is for the memory of his friend. And that's been, to a great extent, the core of the character. Loyalty. To his friends and to his clients. And just how far you go for that loyalty. In short, a great read. Finished it off in the course of half a Saturday and enjoyed the hell out of it. Well worth your time and hard earned dollars.

To use a reviewer's cliche, this book is genre-defying. Yes, it's a thriller. It's also a love story, a kind of modern morality play, and a character study that constantly asks what actions are acceptable responses to absolute corruption. I'll admit I missed some of the characters I've grown to love from the previous novels; few of them feature here. But ultimately that's ok. The best authors lead their protagonists down new roads and challenge them in new ways. This book is fresh and unpredictable, and the themes it addresses are more relevant today than ever. Recommended.

Greg Rucka finally got around to writing a new book about bodyguard Atticus Kodiak. It took him around 6 years to do it. However, it is well worth the wait. If you have never read one of Rucka's Atticus Kodiak books you are in for a treat. Rucka does a great job of character development and narrative. You do not have to be familar with the series to enjoy this book. If you like Vince Flynn you will love this series. My only problem is that I had to wait too long for this book. I hope it doesn't take Rucka another 6 years to follow up on this great book.

Running away after killing a man who was hired to kill them, Atticus Kodiak, Alena Cizkova and Natalie Trent run to the safe house at Cold Spring. Atticus is a wanted man because it is believed he killed his friend Scott Fowler, an FBI agent, when it was Oxford who fired the gun. He leaves the women at the cabin and takes off when two teams of assassins hit them. He makes it back to the cabin after he disposes of them to find Alena and Natalie have dispatched those sent to kill them. Natalie dies and her friends vow to avenge her murder. It takes them years to track down the man who betrayed him and when they catch him the only information he gives up is the contractor is untouchable. In order to find the man who ordered the hits, Alexa and Atticus devise a trap but in Lynch, Wyoming they are trapped by various government agencies and it is only through ingenuity and luck they escape. They are hired by Natalie's father to kill the man who ordered the hit that killed his daughter but to do that Atticus and Alexa, now known as Patriot and Drama must work it so that justice is served without the president and his government being tarnished. Atticus and Alexa can kill in cold blood but they are not stone cold murderers. They live in a different world where murder is a tool yet when they have an easy chance to catch the man who destroyed their lives; they pass, because it would mean involving a woman and child dying. That also means they have to work harder to catch him. Both anti-heroes would not be killing their adversaries, if the contractor`q did not put a hit out on them. Greg Rucka scores a best seller with this thriller. Harriet Klausner

I put aside the book I'd been reading because the new Greg Rucka, PATRIOT ACTS, was released this week. I started reading late Friday night and didn't put it down until I'd finished it Saturday morning. While not as exciting as the last entry into Rucka's Atticus Kodiak series, CRITICAL SPACE, PATRIOT takes the character in a new, darker direction. There's actually far more action then CS, but CS is the only book to give me any sort of physical reaction. There's a chase sequence that lasts for about 60 pages and completes the first act of the book. My heart was beating so fast that I swear I thought I was going to have a heart attack. Nothing in PA comes close that level of reader involvement, but I still couldn't put it down. Rucka's prose is lean and clear. He's the literary equivalent of Bruce Lee in that every movement, or in this case every word, goes straight for the kill. There's no showy time-wasting verbal-ese, just simple writing that rings with the ferocity of a lighening-fueled jackhammer. It's been six years since the last Kodiak novel, and I'm not exactly sure I like there the character is heading. Rucka takes Atticus down a dark road and we watch him loose his last bit of humanity. He started out as a Personal Security Agent in KEEPER, the first of the series. In CS we see his training as a cold-blooded killer. Picking up with the final chapter of CS, PA shows him putting that training to use as he seeks revenge for the death of a friend. Only one of Kodiak's established supporting cast makes an appearence, and that disappointed me. Rucka writes women with a level of humanity that I've never seen from a male writer, and those female characters are sorely missed (for a great example of Rucka's female persepctive, read the stand alone novel A FISTFULL OF RAIN). These characters who comprised who comprised Kodiak's family aren't even referenced by name, only veiled mentions in passing. With this new direction, and a revamped hero, PATRIOT ACTS is a perfect jumping on point for new Rucka readers. I first discovered Rucka through a the comic series WHITEOUT, and 10 years later I still consider it one fo the finest comic series every produced, and definitely the single best suspense comic I've ever read. It was a few years later that I decided to give his prose a try and I was hooked from the first book. During his hiatus, Rucka wrote a few espionage novels that are more in the vein of the BOURNE films rather than BOND. That style of political writing and techno speak makes its way into PA, but unlike Tom Clancy, Rucka never drowns his prose with it. I think most people will enjoy PA as much as me, perhaps more if they're joining the series for the first time and come in with no preconceived notions. Seriously folks, nobody writes thrillers as exhilerating as Rucka, nor as hard-boiled - nobody!