Red Rabbit (Tom Clancy)

This is Tom Clancy at his best! A Regan-era cold war spy novel about a Russian KGB communications officer wanting to defect to the west. The bulk of the novel covers the planning and execution of the CIA plan to get the "Rabbit" and his family to the west. The abridged audio book was well performed with good Russian accents as needed. The abridgement was well done and the story hung-together-well. Yep, a must read.

"Red Rabbit" by Tom Clancy harks back to a younger Jack Ryan. Coming after "Patriot's Game" and before "The Hunt for Red October," Jack Ryan and family find themselves in London; he at British Intelligence, his wife an eye surgeon at a local hospital. The subplot of their culture shock is interesting (Dr. Ryan dumbfounded that British surgeons drink with their lunch before a ticklish proceedure, as an example). The main plot deals with a KGB code clerk who passes word that the Soviets are running an operation to assassinate Pope John Paul II. Jack joins with a small team to attempt to stop them. This book introduces the Folleys; a CIA couple who first appeared in "Cardinal in the Kremlin" and have been in a number of books that followed. Their experience of life in Moscow under a diplomatic cover, alone, is worth the price of the book. As a note, I realize Jack probably isn't a Knight Commander of the Bath, but I'm too lazy to dig "Patriot's Game" out from under my pile of reading to check.

Tom Clancy takes us back to the early days of Jack Ryans life. He is married and has a daughter and apparantly has saved the life of a member of the royal family of England but has not yet begun his political career. This book is based on the attempted assassination of the Pope but Clancy presents the reasoning and thinking of the perpetrators and the interceders. It very well could have happened as Clancy writes. Of course, as he lived to become the President, Ryan perseveres but how he does it makes interesting and true Clancy reading!

For those expecting a Clancy techno-thriller - not this time, just solid character development,history and a great plot.A look at life in the former Soviet Union, from within, and an insight into what ultimatly destroyed it. What may seem like repetition to some reviewers is, in my view, different characters with different information arriving at similar conclusions as the plot develops. This book ended with me wanting more. What next some ask! The clues are all there - read on. Well done Mr. Clancy.

For those afficionados of spy tradecraft, this is one of Clancy's best.As for me, the highlight was Clancy's decision to develop some other characters from previous novels and introduce some new ones to carry forward the plot.While Ryan is in there along with wife in London, he has been marginalized so the discerning reader can skip over the sections in which he does appear without losing any of the meaty plot line which is classic Clancy.It is an apt cliche to say that this is a page burner with enough plot twists to make for an entertaining read that goes too fast.