Hard Target

November 28, 2011
Gordon’s second Gideon Davis foil-the-terrorists thriller (after 2011’s Gideon’s War) lacks the nail-biting tension that was the hallmark of the TV series 24, of which he was executive producer. Having earned the nickname “Man of Peace” for his work as a diplomatic envoy, Davis is quite capable of violence when necessary, as shown by the double-digit body count in his first outing. This time out, an informant tips Davis off to a West Virginia militia that’s plotting a major attack somewhere on U.S. soil targeting the federal government. Familiar plot elements include the FBI bureaucrat who throws obstacles in the paths of the maverick operatives racing the clock, hairbreadth escapes, and a down-to-the-wire climax. Notable among the stick figure characters is Shanelle Greenfield Klotz, “the only biracial, half-black, half-Jew in the Secret Service.” Nothing distinguishes this from the pack of Clancyesque suspense novels. Agent: Rick Rosen.

January 1, 2012
A sequel of sorts to Gordon's debut (Gideon's War, 2011), this anti-Washington conspiracy novel aims high but falls flat. The Davis brothers are back. Gideon, the so-called Man of Peace, is fired up for action after taking out those bad guys in the debut. Tillman, scapegoated by the federal government, is holed up in a cabin in the West Virginia woods. Gideon gets wind of a serious conspiracy being hatched by a militia leader, Jim Verhoven, a neighbor of Tillman's. His fiancée Kate gets it. "Honey," she asks sweetly, "do you want the Glock or the SIG?" Tillman is busy tracking wild boar, but agrees to help Gideon out. Suddenly he's in the middle of a firefight on Verhoven's land between the Feds and the militia, which will leave 12 people dead. It's too much too soon, poor pacing, but it allows Tillman to rescue Verhoven's wicked wife Lorene, gain the conspirators' trust and learn their secrets. Except he doesn't quite, because Verhoven is not the mastermind. That would be Dale Wilmot, an Idaho landowner and businessman, boiling with rage since his son Evan returned from Iraq without his legs. The federal government, all of it, will pay, when its representatives are gathered at the Capitol for the State of the Union. Wilmot has the heating contract for the building and will siphon cyanide gas through the ducts. This would be more compelling if Wilmot was a remotely credible terrorist. It doesn't help that the action is split between the Capitol basement, the Virginia home of a Secret Service agent whose family has been taken hostage, and Idaho, where it's left to a minor character to alert Gideon to the imminent gas attack. The action is further slowed by lectures about security rings, refrigerants and pressurized tanks. No surprise, then, that the climax can't compare for excitement with Tillman's elemental encounter with that monster boar in the woods. Beneath the trappings, hollow at its core.

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January 1, 2012
The follow-up to Gideon's War (2011) reads like another intense season of 24, the show Gordon produced. Gideon Davis is enjoying retirement and life with his fianc'e when he receives evidence of an impending terrorist attack on Washington, D.C. His contacts at his former employer don't believe him or his source. After investigating a bit further and discovering ties to a white-supremacist movement, he recruits his brother, Tillman, to help him stop the plot before lives are lost. Tillman realizes the only way to succeed is if he infiltrates the group. The suspense never wavers for a second, and the main characters are solid. Gordon does a great job of balancing the development of the heroes and nonstop action. Fans of Vince Flynn and the television adventures of Jack Bauer will eat this up. Gordon just keeps getting better.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)