Bell, Ted. (2010). Warlord (6th in the Alexander Hawke series). New York, NY: William Morrow.
ISBN: 978-0062002242
Pages: 532
Genre: suspense/thriller
Annotation: Alex Hawke
confronts a terrorist plot which could destabilize Britain.
Summary: With the death
of the woman he loved Alex Hawke longs for death. He is shocked out of this by
a call from his friend Prince Charles. His Royal Highness’s instincts are
telling him that the latest threat to his family is a true danger to their
safety. As Alex searches for the truth he finds a villain whose hatred goes
beyond the Royal Family. This villain is behind an Islamic terrorist group
which has been making attacks on the United States and taking over Pakistan.
Now Alex must find a way stop this group and its leader before the Royal Family
is killed.
Evaluation: Good read
The characters keep the
reader’s interest and feel real. Hawke is well named: like a hawk he lives for
war and being on the knife edge between life and death. The dynamic between
Hawke and his friend retired Inspector Congreve was hilarious. The villain is
filled with a revenge the reader could understand while being horrified at his
actions. The one character that left me unhappy was the main female character
Sahira Karim. On the one hand, she is very intelligent and provides vital
assistance at one point in the story. On the other hand, her part in the story
seemed mostly w sensationalistic: she meets Alex, they have sex, she disappears
for part of the story and then they go on a mission where they have sex again
and then we don’t see her again. On the plus side, the author does a good job
of tying several storylines together. When the storylines were connected together
it showed how dangerous the villain was. I did wonder how the villain could have
kept his actions, and feelings, hidden from British intelligence. It was easy
for me to predict who he was. My interest was kept, though, because I wanted to
find out how this person turned out the way he did. Still, I think it might
have been better if there was some doubt as to who he was: when his true name
was revealed it felt anticlimactic. In my opinion, the pacing would have been
stronger if the descriptions of attacks carried out by the terrorist group and
the villain were left out. These events showed Smith and the terrorists are
evil, but to me that could have also been accomplished by just mentioning the
events. Going into them in depth, showing how they happened, etc. distracted
from the major point of the story which was finding Smith and stopping his
overall plan. Otherwise I liked the story. As someone who has never fought in
war, and is not attracted to fighting, I do not know much about it. Bell’s
portrayal of the characters and descriptions of aspects such as logistics,
weapons, etc. gave me insight. I do not know the plausibility of the details of
how the terrorist group recruited members and planned attacks, but somehow they
felt plausible. If so it is chilling. This is a good read for fans of
warfare/spy thrillers and/or people who want a look into the world of terrorism.
What else to read:
Other books by Ted Bell.
Blood And Rage: A Cultural History Of Terrorism by Michael Burleigh
for learning more about terrorism.
The Infernal Machine: A History of Terrorism by Matthew Carr for
another perspective on terrorism.
The Midnight House (John
Wells series) by Alex Berenson for another terrorist suspense novel.
The Kill Artist (number
one in the Gabriel Allon series) by
Daniel Silva for another ex-intelligence agent fighting against terrorism.
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