The Renegades

Starred review from May 28, 2012
Young’s experience as a pilot in several war zones informs every line of his riveting third novel featuring Air Force Lt. Col. Michael Parson (after 2011’s Silent Enemy). Now an adviser to a helicopter unit in Afghanistan, Parson requests that his interpreter friend, Sgt. Maj. Sophia Gold, be deployed back to Afghanistan to help with relief efforts after a major earthquake. Just as Parson and his team are about to lift off with a number of injured Afghans, members of a terrorist group called the Black Crescent shoot up their helicopter; soon after, they kidnap a 10-year-old boy from a nearby village. Parson and Gold get on the trail of the Crescent leader, Chaaku (the Pashto word for knife), and in a last deadly battle bring a measure of justice to their corner of the war. Young’s precise, evocative prose brings a far-off war into sharp-edge focus while honoring the heroic servicemen and women who fight against extraordinary odds. Agent: Michael Carlisle, Inkwell Management.