"...he stood up and laid down a shitload of fire"There, that's my man Reilly dishing out an action scene the way it supposed to be. Profanity, heart thumping last-second action sequences, claustrophobia inducing movement depiction, a robot going ape shit on your enemies, Ospreys, missiles, submarines...hold on...let me catch my breath a bit, OK?.....phew!...where were we? Oh yeah, describing a quintessential Matthew Reilly book on Scarecrow. Look, don't pick a Matthew Reilly book looking for logic in story development (the protagonists survive a goddamn direct nuke attack, OK?), smooth story flow (Look at my sentence of this review, that's how this author sums up every gun fight), nope, not gonna happen. This is a book you wanna pick for some raw, unadulterated action. A menu that this author prepares and puts together like goddamn Gordon Ramsay while hurling profane words at you. I personally think that Bertie was an exceptional idea but hopefully will not be continued in another book. The Calderon angle was a bit abrupt but developed well through some sub-plot switching, the polar bears were so obviously space-fillers the author threw in to pump the book size but that's fine, I liked it; the French chickadee (as Mother refers to her) could have been given some vital statistics (Look, I need to picture a hot woman in commando fatigues ok? but since the author brings the lust angle later I pictured her as some man-shouldered ugly chick when she surfaces from the French sub and first impressions stick), Mother's marriage life was a bit dragged out as I picture her to be an hard as nails Marine but to think she goes home to be wifey to some dumb trucker makes you wanna scratch yourself hard. Overall, an excellent action-thriller bearing Mr. Reilly's signature no-logic wham bham! stamp. I just hope he does not overdo the personal back-story thing in his forthcoming books like his countryman Mr. Flynn.
