Violence of Action

This is the first novel I've read in this series. A great story,and well written by someone who really knows what he's writing about. Actually, I think this sort of a story can be better done as a novel as opposed to a movie.I find that movies today are too short on description of how things work and too long on special effects. I read a Western series called Longarm which is set in the Old West in the period following the Civil War and up till the late 1880's. In many ways, this is the same sort of story but dealing with modern weapons,helicopters,espionage,and terrorists as opposed to outlaws,horses,six guns ,deserts,soiled doves and saloons. However; in both cases we get the chase,and shoot-outs between the good and bad guys. Because the author has actually lived the world he writes aout ,we are given a real insight into this modern world of protecting the people who operate in the world of Terrorism. We see how the stakes are so high today with the weapons available to terrorists when compared with rhe limited damage that could be accomplished by the outlaws of old. While reading novels is not the greatest source of learning how things work;I believe there is a lot to learn from this book ;particularly the methods and tools used to fight terrorism. Here's a sample of some of the great lies from the book; "An expert is someone who does the basics better than anyone else." "Gun control means hitting the target." "It must be a defect in my personality." "Afterward he goes back under the glass where all good Rogue Warriors should be kept until they're needed."

This book was GREAT. He finally bucked off the b/s and got down to business. People are squeamish about the torture in the book and think it wasn't necessary. Hell, I think it made it more believeable. Dick didn't like it, but he had to do it. Just Like he preaches. I think most people wouldn't have had the courage to go against their principles and torture someone in that instance. Most of us would have let Portland get nuked. Period.I think leaving all the asides out was great. So was Dick having to go and "find" himself. NEWS FLASH!!! Demo Dick is HUMAN!!! Imagine that??? He got away from the psychobabble and got down to earth. He told us a story of what could be, instead of just entertaining us. I think the book was meant to be a shocking "What if?" If that happened, that is what Dick would do. What would you do??? Whine and snivel in the corner, or KATN? Thanks, Dick, for your continuous reminders that there are still Americans willing to FIGHT for this wonderful country we live in. No matter what the costs...

This book, written without Mr. Weisman, was superior to those written with him. Far more tailored and direct, it sounds as one would expect Marcinko to sound. There is none of the past attempts to soften his image, but rather a book more akin to the first autobiography that pulled few punches. The polish and plot weaving of a professional author isn't here, but if you are looking for that perhaps you should be reading King. I enjoyed the lack of it in exchange for a plot that was, as Marcinko would himself say, K.I.S.S but effective. I applaud the Commander's newest book, and hope that he will continue in this path. Being a strong woman myself, I also enjoyed the addition of the intense female team member. Men do not have the monopoly on 'violence of action'!

Anybody thinking Dick Marchinco had become an anachronism got a wake-up call on 9/11 of last year. Arguably, that included Marchinco himself, since his recent books, while still lots of fun to read, had become formula-driven - not really the work of a man feeling himself in tune with his times. However, with Violence in Action, Demo Dick is back with us in lethal force, invigorated once again with the purpose of his life. It's the best book he's produced since the original Rogue Warrior appeared more than a decade ago. While the distinctive Rogue voice will be recognizable to readers of this series, many of the formulaic elements are diminished or gone - the rambling asides, the sarcastic portraits of inept bureaucrats, the convoluted accounts of global detective work, punctuated by stylized bursts of action, as Dick and his boys unravel some new terrorist conspiracy. Violence of Action, in contrast, proceeds without digression, like a cannon shot from page one to the end. Surprisingly, Marchino chooses not to exploit the mood of the times here to cast Islamic militants as his villains. His Bad Guys are American white supremacists who spout mystical gibberish about Yahweh and have seized a nuclear device with which they plan to incinerate Portland, Oregon. Moreover, they're not only home-grown Americans, but former Navy Seals - blood brothers to Dick - who have drifted way off the reservation and betrayed everything he holds holy. The fury with which he hunts them down is unprecedented in anything he's written. There's a graphic torture scene early in the book that I could have done without and that most readers will find abhorrent. However, Dick doesn't revel in the ugly business - he simply describes it - and he seems to be making a philosophical point of sorts, since the information extracted from one thug's pain, in the end, saves the lives of half a million or so innocents. Ironically, in this most furious of his books, Marchinco seems finally to have wrapped his testosterone-addled brain around the idea of females in the military: both the fiercest warrior on his new combat team, and his new boss, whom he honestly respects, are women. Who says that Old Rogues are set in their attitudes? Anyone who reads Marchinco either loves him or hates him - he destroys all middle ground. His fans will be enthralled by this book, and to them I recommend it.

Weisman isn't a co-author of this book so it has a different feel to it than all the other books in the Rogue Warrior series. This one is a bit more graphic in its descriptions: see Chapter 8 (the interrogation) to understand what I mean, but for true fans of the series, it'll be SSDD as compared previous books in the series and the extra gore will be welcome. Other minor differences are that the "Ten Commandments" and almost all of the characters of old are gone. This makes me wonder if Marcinko doesn't fully own the copyright on them which means that he couldn't use them. Oddly enough, the chapter intro quotes range from everyone from Napoleon to Sun Tzu to...Pink!Regardless of how its format diverges from previous books in the series, the story is a good: a stolen pocket nuke being used to terrorize Portland, President Bush and other White House staffers hang him out to dry, etc. However this time around, he's shooting and looting while on a presidential pardon which gives him carte blanche to do what he wants. Ah, finally!As other reviewers have remarked, the story length is a bit short, which is ironic considering the self-professed size of his, uhm, uh...you know. After ten novels, the series is starting to run out of steam, but it's still quite enjoyable. Now UNODIR, go and read this book!