Aviation-centered thrillers have certainly grabbed the public’s imagination recently.
Whether we are talking about T.J. Newman’s thriller “Falling” (read my review) or the Netflix movie “Carry-On” (which ranks as one of the streamer’s most-watched movies), we’ve seen some terrific stories built around airplanes, airports, and the world of aviation.
Brad Thor and fellow novelist Ward Larsen have entered the fray with “Cold Zero.”
Both writers have had fruitful careers in the thriller genre — Thor with his venerable Scot Harvath series and Larsen with his David Slaton thrillers. (Larsen has also published a number of standalone novels.)
I have read and reviewed books by both authors on this blog and was thrilled to receive an advance reader copy of “Cold Zero” from the publisher.
The narrative in “Cold Zero” centers around Hemisphere Airlines Flight 777, an ultra first-class carrier geared toward high-end clients.
In the opening pages of the novel, the CIA manages to extract Dr. Chen Li (a computer scientist) from China and puts him on the Hemisphere flight— a flight that is bound for New York City.
Along for the ride is a technology he invented called Sky Fire — a suite of software that has the ability to give geopolitical superiority to those who control it.
Dr. Li is under the watch of a CIA officer named Kasey Sheridan.
When the airliner crashes in the Arctic Circle under mysterious circumstances, Li and Sheridan find themselves in a fight to survive and a fight to keep Sky Fire from falling into the wrong hands.
Forces from the United States, Russia, and China are soon in the game as the fate of the world hangs in the balance.
Despite the novel’s frigid setting, “Cold Zero” is a cool “beach read.” The chapters are short and snappy and the overall story chugs along at top speed.
Larsen’s experience as a pilot is on display in the novel. He flew more than 20 missions while serving in the U.S. Air Force during Operation Desert Storm. He has also been an airline pilot and is a trained aircraft accident investigator.
Aviation-related sequences have been solid in his previous novels and they are strong again in “Cold Zero.”
According to Deadline, “True Detective” creator Nic Pizzolatto will adapt the screenplay and Peter Berg (who directed “Lone Survivor” and the underrated thriller “The Kingdom”) is set to produce under his Film 44 banner (which has a first-look deal with Netflix).
Overall, the Thor/Larsen “team up” for “Cold Zero” has resulted in an action-packed novel that serves as a terrific introduction to two of today’s best thriller writers.
“Rapp didn’t make a practice of asking the Almighty for help, but he wouldn’t turn down an extra magazine or two right about now.”
Last year I had the opportunity to meet thriller scribes Kyle Mills and Don Bentley at a tour event in support of the release of the Mitch Rapp novel “Code Red” at Once Upon a Crime — a neat little hole-in-the-wall bookstore in Uptown Minneapolis.
Bridget surprised me with the trip. It had been a difficult year for a number of reasons. My dad’s death the previous December had been hard on me, and I just hadn’t been feeling like myself.
“Code Red” was set to be Mills’ last entry in Vince Flynn’s venerable book series (Flynn died of prostate cancer in 2013). Mills had decided to move on after penning nine Mitch Rapp novels, and was set to hand the writing duties over to Bentley.
We drove up to the Twin Cities from Omaha that Sept. 12 morning, checked into our hotel next to the Mall of America (we planned to visit IKEA the next day), and made our way to the event in harried rush hour traffic.
It turned out to be a terrific experience.
In addition to having the chance to chat with Mills and Bentley during the signing (and introduce ourselves to fellow fans we’ve gotten to know on social media), we also had the opportunity to meet Flynn’s widow Lysa and her husband — both were incredibly down-to-earth and gracious and even offered some suggestions for places to eat after the event.
At the time, it seemed like it would be an eternity until Bentley’s first entry in the series was published.
But life’s clock has an uncanny ability to turn faster as you get older, and it feels like it has only been a few ticks since last year’s release.
I’ve had the pleasure of consuming an advance reader copy of “Capture or Kill” the past few weeks as part of the Mitch Rapp Ambassador program. The novel will be available at retailers on Sept. 3 (preorder your copy here).
In “Capture or Kill,” Bentley takes readers back to 2011, a decade into the War on Terror and a point when Vince Flynn’s literary career was at its zenith.
The novel is centered around the real-life raid by U.S. Navy SEALs on Osama Bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan on May 2, 2011.
When I first heard about the premise for the story, I was curious about how Bentley would handle the narrative structure. Real-life events can be a tricky thing for an author to navigate around — especially an operation this specific.
But Bentley — who has written four novels in his Matt Drake series and four Jack Ryan, Jr. novels in the Tom Clancy franchise since 2020 — is able to steer the plot effectively.
Bentley’s military experience is present throughout “Capture or Kill.” He went to Ohio State on an ROTC scholarship and spent a decade in the Army as an Apache pilot after graduation.
While serving as a Troop Commander in Afghanistan, Bentley had first-hand experience in the ill-fated Operation Red Wings. I first recall reading about that SEAL Team 10 operation in Marcus Luttrell’s book “Lone Survivor” (later a movie starring Mark Wahlberg).
The stetson-wearing Apache pilots make an appearance in “Capture or Kill.” (I don’t know if “Surf and Turf Fridays” were a real thing when Don served, but the mention definitely made my salivary glands perk up.)
It’s neat that Bentley chose to feature the multi-role attack helicopters he flew in combat. He also features other notable aircraft in the story, including the CH-47 Chinook helicopter.
Bentley manages to strike a nice balance between the ballsy tradecraft Flynn’s loyal followers have come to love and the nitty-gritty details on military operations that epitomize some of the great novels in the genre.
The overall effect is Mitch Rapp novel that is less shaken and more stirred.
In addition to a number of old favorites, we also get to meet some new characters in “Capture or Kill.”
I particularly enjoyed covert operative Noreen Ahmed and Sgt. Fred Saxton, a feisty Army Ranger.
Bentley tosses in a couple of creative nods to fellow thriller writers Nick Petrie and Mark Greaney. He even finds a way to get his own son in on the action in “Capture or Kill”…
…and there are a number of additional surprises along the way!
I first started reading this breed of novel in 1989 when I was a sophomore in high school. I fondly recall pre-ordering a copy of “Clear and Present Danger” later that year at a Waldenbooks a couple blocks from our home.
Bridget and I started dating the following year. One of her brothers was in the Marine Corps at the time (he currently works for a three-letter agency). Her father and his twin brother had the honor of marching in President John F. Kennedy’s Inauguration Day parade when they served in the Army.
Both of us have enjoyed stories about the men and women who work diligently each day to protect our freedoms. I know Vince Flynn felt the same way when he published his first novel (“Term Limits”) in 1997.
That spirit is still on display after all these years in “Capture or Kill.” Bentley gives Flynn’s Rapp series a shot of retro adrenaline, and the narrative choice pays dividends for readers in the end.
“He was simply providing an estimate in the same manner a good home contractor could eyeball a kitchen and ballpark the remodeling cost. Rapp was a craftsman and killing was his craft.”
It will be interesting to see where Bentley takes Mitch Rapp in future novels. The character was facing something of an existential dilemma after Mills’ last two entries in the series. Can the family man that Mitch has become stay as sharp as he once was?
“Capture or Kill” reminds us how effective and entertaining Rapp can be when he is out there as the proverbial “tip of the spear.”
I can’t wait to see what Don Bentley has in store for readers next year…!
I needed this. I've been in something of a “book slump” recently.
Have you ever been in a book slump? As a reader, it can be a frustrating thing.
I always have a book in hand, and I like to feel like I'm making progress in my reading goals each year. But sometimes I just get stuck — and can’t seem to finish anything.
Since I started reading Vince Flynn's venerable Mitch Rapp series back in 2006, the novels have become “go to” stories that serve as a “literary elixir” for me.
But when you are all caught up with a series, you have to wait patiently — with eager anticipation — to see what the next book will bring.
“Oath of Loyalty” follows “tip of the spear” operator Rapp as he deals with the aftermath of events in 2021’s “Enemy at the Gates” (read my review).
Our hero has a lot on his plate (both literally and figuratively) in this novel.
As the story begins, Rapp is dealing with the aftermath of a tense (and tragic) showdown with a long-time colleague.
President Anthony Cook is hellbent on nullifying the perceived threat Rapp poses to his administration.
In addition, various assassins-for-hire (including a new player known only as “Legion”) are on the trail of our protagonist and his make-shift family — former assassin Claudia Gould and her daughter Anna (named after Rapp’s deceased wife).
Author Kyle Mills keeps the focus primarily on Rapp in this outing, dishing up a thriller with healthy portions of our hero's domestic life.
“Oath of Loyalty” illustrates Mills’ range in the genre as he ratchets up the narrative intrigue.
Instead of macro-level events seen in recent entries — such as a pandemic-level threat in “Lethal Agent” (read my review) or a mass power outage in “Total Power” (read my review) — smaller moments fuel the suspense in “Oath of Loyalty.”
(If you ever wondered if “household errands” could be fodder for building tension in a thriller novel, wonder no more.)
In that regard, the novel has a kinship with 2008’s “Extreme Measures” and 2009’s “Pursuit of Honor” — shedding light on the pitfalls of mixing a family with a career in espionage.
There is also an undercurrent running through “Oath of Loyalty” that echoes the political climate fueling unrest in the United States today.
Mills alludes to the concept of a world where global power is accumulated by a loose alliance of dictators throwing their weight around — an environment where weakness and compromise aren’t tolerated.
President Cook hopes to be at the helm of this new world order.
One of the returning players introduced in "Enemy at the Gates" is trillionaire Nicholas Ward (described by Mills in interviews as a cross between Elon Musk and Bill Gates) who has a foundation dedicated to solving the world’s ills.
Mills (yet again) proves to be prescient as it regards the power, influence, and controversy he imbued in Ward.
In the intervening year since the publication of “Enemy at the Gates,” we’ve watched as Elon Musk has become the world’s wealthiest person, attempted to purchase Twitter, and become a political lightning rod in the process.
In the same vein, there is a subtext in “Oath of Loyalty” that hints at Ward working to build his sphere of influence. The question posed is whether or not the trillionaire (with his vast resources) could reshape the world in a way that governments are incapable of doing.
It will be fascinating to see what Mills has in store for that character in the future — and how his relationship with Rapp evolves.
Mills has been adept at shifting the course of Mitch Rapp’s future in incremental steps through eight novels. What we have in “Oath of Loyalty” is a protagonist who has more depth and nuance than he did in the early entries in this series.
Rapp’s future is hazy, and that uncertainty presents a variety of interesting opportunities for Mills going forward.
I’m curious to see how things develop!
A key aspect of Mills’ work in the Mitch Rapp series (since taking over for Vince Flynn after the author’s death in 2013) is his effortless prose.
Mills (an author known for crafting detailed outlines prior to writing) is an underrated wordsmith. There is a readability factor in his work that elevates the overall pace and keeps you turning the pages.
As the years progress, I become more convinced that “how” a book is written is just as important as “what” the book is about (maybe more).
In the case of “Oath of Loyalty,” the symbiosis between the craftsmanship and plot is terrific. That one-two punch might make this Mills’ most enjoyable novel yet!
As I mentioned earlier, I received an advance copy of “Oath of Loyalty” as part of the “Mitch Rapp Ambassador” program. If you are interested in learning more about the program — and learning more about the Mitch Rapp series — head over to the official website for additional details.
It’s also worth following the official Vince Flynn Twitter and Facebook accounts if you haven’t done so. In addition to the “Mitch Rapp Ambassador” program, there are other fun giveaways and contests throughout the year.
I’ve pre-ordered my copy of “Oath of Loyalty” in hardcover. You can order your copy here. It will arrive Sept. 13, 2022.
