Shadow of Doubt

The Book in 1 Sentence

In the aftermath of Harvath's revenge for the death of his wife and his support of the Ukrainian war effort, the CIA force him to attempt to betray his friends to thwart a Russian nuclear attack.

Brief Review

What a high speed and entertaining book. A true to form for the current Brad Thor. The action is high, the tradecraft is high, and you get scenes of heart thumping suspense. There are some issues of Deus Ex Machina (plot armor), but that might be the worst part of the book.

Why I Read this book

Love this series and while I am starting the series over, this was the new one.

In-Depth Review (Favorite Quotes)

The last 3 books have just rolled together as far as time and this is the beginning of my complaint on Deus Ex Machina. As the book goes, Harvath takes about 16 hours of sleep for about a weeks worth of time. This is this book and the previous book had something similar. Harvath might be on HGH, cocaine, and a plethora of other drugs based on the phrase "Harvath took performance enhancing drugs and other things to continue to give him the edge" or something like that. However, that doesn't give him the superhuman ability to operate under limited sleep in such high stress situations. Its is absolutely crazy that he was as "on" as he was in this book.

The other part that really started to pile up in this book was the number of "the round missed by millimeters" or other statements that were very close to the same statement. He doesn't get hurt, he doesn't miss a beat, and other than him stating he was going to give his team a larger role, he always had the answer.

The frustrations aside, this book is entertaining. The gun fights are so well described that you can see each action in your mind with ease. There concurrent story telling of the investigations are a nice world building to add to the concern you have about what is going to happen. I think that the story of revenge has run its course. I know that most people would want to do it with something important, but it's been 3 books of it.

Rating

I really enjoyed the book. It wasn't hard to suspend disbelief about Harvath being surrounded by the aura of God because he is basically immortal, but it's fine. I really enjoyed the plot line and action. Brad's storytelling is superb. This is a great 8.

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