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Ludlum's nineteenth, and another New York Times Bestseller. I've read and enjoyed all the others. The story: Agent H. Latham has penetrated a neo-Nazi organization called the Brotherhood Of The Watch. BOTW is actively planning the Fourth Reich with a new Fuhrer and a high-tech brain implant and much infiltration, undercover work, and Lebensraum. Latham returns to France from the neo-Nazi camp deep in totally protected German mountain ranges with a list of neo-Nazi collaborators from around the world. Apparently the list contains hundreds if not thousands of names, many of whom are top leaders in every significant country in the world. Latham is killed by the BOTW elite exterminator squad in Paris, and his brother, an agent for a different branch of the US government, swears to complete the mission and find his brother's killers. He does. Along the way he involves a cast of scores from many nations and enough derringdo, explosions, citadel assaults and a murky romantic sub-plot to satisfy almost anyone. But it's too bad the printing industry invented italic type. Ludlum uses a lot of it. Sometimes it signifies internal thought, usually in turmoil. Sometimes italics are used for emphasis. There's a lot of that. In fact, it is rare to find anyone in this book, except perhaps an occasional waiter, who doesn't cry, scream, explode (verbally) yell, sob, insist, demand. Characters rarely walk, instead they run, jump, fly, crash, fling themselves, pivot, agonize, plunge, etc., etc. To suggest this novel is neither well-written nor well edited is perhaps, an overstatement. If you like this sort of stuff, here's a whiz-banger for you. The plot is up-to-date, drawn from current real-life thought and action. It 's just too bad Ludlum didn't do a better job of exploring this truly frightening world movement.
Reviewed by Carl Brookins, May 2003
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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)
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