Title: Kill Shot
Author: Vince Flynn
Review: This is the book I was looking for when I read the latest James Bond book (and was disappointed). Vince Flynn has captured perfectly the ramped up modern movie spy better than I have seen anywhere else (think the Craig’s Bond or the Bourne movies). You have a super tough and intelligent action hero fighting the world’s evils one bad guy at a time.
The make reference several times in the book that the hero, Mitch Rapp, is a very linear guy. In that he doesn’t spend a lot of time worrying about the past. He has a task to achieve and he pursues it relentlessly. Crap happens and he just adapts and continues on. This book was a movie with words, it was fun. The pacing of the story just sped along without any speed bumps to slow the action down. And Flynn avoided the trap of making the hero infallible, but he did use the action hero cliché and give him a bullet to his shoulder (the only place an action hero can get shot and still keep going).
The only downside is the solving of all problems with a well placed bullet. The concept that America is awesome and the bad guys are just wrong can be a little hard to swallow for some – but you guys shouldn’t read this book. This is a thrill ride to be enjoyed and not a political handbook to solve the world’s problem. So you negative nabobs can just lighten up and get a life. You missed the point of this book.
Review: This is the book I was looking for when I read the latest James Bond book (and was disappointed). Vince Flynn has captured perfectly the ramped up modern movie spy better than I have seen anywhere else (think the Craig’s Bond or the Bourne movies). You have a super tough and intelligent action hero fighting the world’s evils one bad guy at a time.
The make reference several times in the book that the hero, Mitch Rapp, is a very linear guy. In that he doesn’t spend a lot of time worrying about the past. He has a task to achieve and he pursues it relentlessly. Crap happens and he just adapts and continues on. This book was a movie with words, it was fun. The pacing of the story just sped along without any speed bumps to slow the action down. And Flynn avoided the trap of making the hero infallible, but he did use the action hero cliché and give him a bullet to his shoulder (the only place an action hero can get shot and still keep going).
The only downside is the solving of all problems with a well placed bullet. The concept that America is awesome and the bad guys are just wrong can be a little hard to swallow for some – but you guys shouldn’t read this book. This is a thrill ride to be enjoyed and not a political handbook to solve the world’s problem. So you negative nabobs can just lighten up and get a life. You missed the point of this book.
Copyright: 2012
Pages: 448
ISBN: 978-1-4165-9520-5
Quick Review: 4.5 Stars out of 5.
Why I Read it: Spies, action, Minnesota author – what’s not to love?
Where I Obtained the Book: Sent to me by the publisher for review
Synopsis: Flynn is back with another nail-biting political thriller that follows the young Mitch Rapp on a deadly mission to hunt down the men responsible for the Pan Am Lockerbie terrorist attack. Rapp has become a liability, and he absolutely cannot be allowed to be taken alive by the French authorities. But it will soon become clear that nothing is more dangerous than a wounded and cornered Mitch Rapp.
Synopsis: Flynn is back with another nail-biting political thriller that follows the young Mitch Rapp on a deadly mission to hunt down the men responsible for the Pan Am Lockerbie terrorist attack. Rapp has become a liability, and he absolutely cannot be allowed to be taken alive by the French authorities. But it will soon become clear that nothing is more dangerous than a wounded and cornered Mitch Rapp.
The fifth of seven children, Vince Flynn was born in St. Paul, Minnesota, in 1966. He graduated from the St. Thomas Academy in 1984, and the University of St. Thomas with a degree in economics in 1988. After college he went to work for Kraft General Foods where he was an account and sales marketing specialist. In 1990 he left Kraft to accept an aviation candidate slot with the United States Marine Corps. One week before leaving for Officers Candidate School, he was medically disqualified from the Marine Aviation Program, due to several concussions and convulsive seizures he suffered growing up. While trying to obtain a medical waiver for his condition, he started thinking about writing a book. This was a very unusual choice for Flynn since he had been diagnosed with dyslexia in grade school and had struggled with reading and writing all his life.
Having been stymied by the Marine Corps, Flynn returned to the nine-to-five grind and took a job with United Properties, a commercial real estate company in the Twin Cities. During his spare time he worked on an idea he had for a book. After two years with United Properties he decided to take a big gamble. He quit his job, moved to Colorado, and began working full time on what would eventually become Term Limits . Like many struggling artists before him, he was a bartender at night and wrote during the day. Five years and more than sixty rejection letters later he took the unusual step of self-publishing his first novel. The book went to number one in the Twin Cities, and within a week had a new agent and two-book deal with Pocket Books, a Simon & Schuster imprint.
Term Limits hit the New York Times bestseller list in paperback and started a trend for all of Flynn's novels. Since then, his books have become perennial bestsellers in both paperback and hardcover, and he has become known for his research and prescient warnings about the rise of Islamic Radical Fundamentalism and terrorism. Read by current and former presidents, foreign heads of state, and intelligence professionals around the world, Flynn's novels are taken so seriously one high-ranking CIA official told his people, “I want you to read Flynn's books and start thinking about how we can more effectively wage this war on terror.”
October 2007 marked another milestone in Flynn’s career when his ninth political thriller, Protect and Defend, became a #1 New York Times bestseller. A few months later, CBS Films optioned the rights for Flynn’s Mitch Rapp character with the intention of creating a character-based, action-thriller movie franchise. Lorenzo di Bonaventura, who previously launched the Harry Potter and Matrix films as head of production at Warner Bros., and Nick Wechsler (We Own the Night, Reservation Road) will produce the films.
Other Reviews:
USA Today - great author info here.
The Book Reporter
National Review Online
I have wanted to read this book.
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