Please note this is novel is a direct sequel to The Mayan Resurrection and third in an on-going series. This review may contain potential spoilers for those who have not read books one and two. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. Fate comes full circle… It is 2047: fourteen years since Jacob Gabriel descended into the Mayan netherworld, while his twin brother turned from their chosen path, opting to remain behind.   Immanuel Gabriel – still running from the forces that hunt his bloodline – believes his actions proved his role in the Mayan prophecy to be nothing but an ancient myth. Now, though, he will realize his mistake.  As the prophecy begins to repeat itself and mankind once again faces annihilation, Immanuel learns there was only ever one person with the power to end the cycle of destruction: himself. Three successive generations of the Gabriel family have now been involved in the race to save the Earth from itself. This novel finally brings them all together, no mean feat when at least one of them has been dead for decades. The action moves from 2047 back to 1990 and then forward again to the eve of the apocalyptic event the Mayans predicted…

Mitch Rapp is a man on a mission For months, Mitch has been working his way through a list of men responsible for the Pan Am Lockerbie bombing – bullet by bullet. His next target – a Libyan diplomat – should be easy. Prone to drink and currently is Paris without a bodyguard, Rapp quickly tracks the man down and sends a bullet into his skull while he’s sleeping. But at the moment he squeezes the trigger, the door to the hotel room is kicked open and gunfire erupts around him. A wounded Rapp escapes with his life, but when the news breaks in France he is a wanted man. His handlers have only one choice. Rapp has become a liability, and he must not be taken alive. Alone in Paris, on the run from the authorities and from his own employers, Mitch Rapp must prepare to fight for his life. Kill Shot suffers the unenviable task of try to be all things to all people. It needs to please all the existing Mitch Rapp fans out there, as this is the twelfth book in the series I imagine that there are quite a few, as well as draw in…

Where there’s Hope there’s trouble…  A former elite member of the SAS, Ben Hope is tortured by a tragedy from his past and now devotes his life to rescuing kidnapped children. But when Ben is recruited to locate an ancient manuscript which could save a dying child, he embarks on the deadliest quest of his life.  The document is alleged to contain the formula for the elixir of life, discovered by the brilliant alchemist Fulcanelli decades before. But it soon becomes apparent that others are hunting this most precious of treasures – for far more evil ends.  It seems that everyone – from the Nazis during WW2 and powerful Catholic organisation Gladius Domini – want to uncover the secrets of immortality. Teaming up with American scientist Dr Roberta Ryder, the trail leads them from Paris to the ancient Cathar strongholds of the Languedoc, where an astonishing secret has lain hidden for centuries… Last year I read both of Scott G. Mariani’s Vampire Federation novels Uprising and The Cross. After I had finished reading them I discovered that he writes thrillers as well, under the name Scott Mariani. I guess the G. is important when it comes to writing horror? I’m…

A brutal murder. An ancient temple. A long-lost treasure. Buried deep under Istanbul, a secret is about to resurface with explosive consequences… Sean Ryan arrives in the ancient city to identify the body of his friend and colleague Alek Zegliwski. Alek has been savagely beheaded, his body discovered near the sacred archaeological sit of Hagia Sophia in Istanbul. Aided by British diplomat Isabel Sharp, Sean inches closer to snaring Alek’s assassin. Evil is at work and when a lethal virus is unleashed on the city panic spreads fast. Time is running out for Sean and Isabel. They must catch the killer before it’s too late. Sean and Isabel make a believable pairing, he is methodical and steadfastly refuses to walk away from the mystery surrounding his best friend’s murder while Isabel is tenacious and driven to help Sean discover the truth. Their separate strengths compliment one another and as the plot develops it’s nice to see the relationship that forms between them. You get a sense of the trust that they have in one another as they are flung from one desperate situation to another. There is also just enough backstory included for the reader to appreciate that these individuals are, in…

Jake Reese is an ordinary guy with an ordinary job, trying to block out the memory of his violent past by planning for the future with his new wife, Diane. But the past has a habit of refusing to stay buried… When two men attack Jake in a car park and cut off his ring finger, he tries to dismiss it as an unlucky case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. But when events take a more sinister turn and Diane goes missing, Jake knows he can no longer hide from the truth. As he embarks on a mission to find Diane, Jake finds himself dragged back into the life he thought he had walked away from forever and the days ahead begin to unfold in terrifying ways… Occasionally I enjoy reading a novel that is totally different from my usual tastes. Sometimes I need to take a break from horror, science fiction, and fantasy, so that when I do return to them I do so with fresh eyes. A good thriller is the perfect way to do this. Any book that I choose though, still has to meet the same criteria I look for in other…

Humanity has always believed it is the only intelligent species of life in the universe. But while excavating in Israel, an archaeologist unearths a tomb that has remained hidden for 7,000 years. Inside lies a secret of such magnitude that the story of mankind is instantly rewritten – and its future thrown into terrible danger. Only one man can piece history back together again. Only one man will risk everything to prevent a catastrophe that could tear the world apart.  That man is Ethan Warner. I always envisaged that putting together a decent thriller novel is much like making a cake. There is a recipe that outlines all the key ingredients that need to be included to make it turn out perfectly. The instructions would probably read something like this. Start with a slightly jaded hero, if you can get one who has a troubled past so much the better. Add a couple of dashes of political intrigue and, if you have it, a sprinkling of potentially controversial subject matter. Mix well with a secondary narrative that will eventually shed additional light on the first, then after around six hundred pages you’ll have an ideal thriller. Covenant is a pretty good example…

Please note The Mayan Resurrection is the direct sequel to The Mayan Prophecy and the following review will likely contain spoilers for those that have not read the first novel. The prize was our salvation. The price was his soul. After sacrificing himself to preserve the human race, Michael Gabriel is imprisoned in a torturous, purgatory-like dimension in the Mayan netherworld. The Mayan prophecy states that the Hero Twins – Michael’s sons Jacob and Immanuel, born to his wife Dominique the year after his entrapment  – must travel to the Mayan realm in their twentieth year to free and resurrect him. Yet it also carries a warning. Born on the same day as the twins is a dark force that threatens their destiny. This, the Abomination – the female yin to their yang – represents evil in its purest form, and will not yield until they succumb to its temptation. The 21st December 2012, the winter solstice has come and gone and the prophecised apocalypse has been averted by Michael Gabriel. He has saved all of humanity by sacrificing himself. The Mayan Resurrection picks up a few months after the events in the climax of The Mayan Prophecy and follows…

Please note that Instinct is the second Chess Team novel by Jeremy Robinson. This novel may contain minor spoilers if you haven’t read Pulse. When the President of the United States falls victim to a weaponized amd contagious strain of a genetic disease – one that kills its victims without warning or symptom – Special Forces commander Jack ‘King’ Sigler is on the case. He and his team of highly trained operators have been assigned to protect a CDC detective as she journeys to the source of the new strain: Vietnam’s Annamite Mountains.  Surrounded by old landmines, harsh jungle terrain, and more than one military force not happy about the return of American boots to the Ho Chi Minh trail, the fight for survival becomes a grueling battle. Pursued by the VLPA Death Volunteers, Vietnam’s Special Forces unit, the team’s flight through a maze of archaic ruins reveals an ancient secret that may stop the disease from sweeping the globe – even as it threatens both the mission and their lives.  Before we begin I have a question. Have you ever seen the movie Crank starring Jason Statham? It is a non-stop assault on the senses as Jason rampages across…

It was the last thing he wanted, but Joe Ledger is back… Saturday 09:11 Hours: a blast rocks a London Hospital. Thousands are dead or injured… 10:09 Hours: Joe Ledger arrives on the scene to investigate. I knew going into this review that I was in for a compelling read. The last Joe Ledger novel, The Dragon Factory, ended with an event that was guaranteed to have repercussions in the series going forward and I was curious where the story would go. The members of the Department of Military Sciences (DMS) have suffered a loss and as this third novel begins Joe is on leave in the UK and facing an uncertain future.  When an explosion destroys a London hospital Joe is drawn back into the murky world of counter terrorism and global conspiracies. A new group, called The Seven Kings, are on the rise and it is up to the DMS to try and stop them. Using the ten plagues of Egypt as their template The Kings are trying to generate as much chaos throughout the world as is possible. They are wealthy and powerful group, having near limitless resources. The DMS are finally up against a foe that can match…

An ancient prophecy. An evil older than mankind. It is the beginning of the end. I was about three or four pages into The Mayan Prophecy by Steve Alten when I had a niggling suspicion that everything seemed awfully familiar. After bit of hunting around at the front of the book I discovered that the novel was originally published under the title Domain back in 2001. Though I had read it before, I decided to re-read and refresh my opinion of the novel. The Mayan calendar runs out on the 21st December 2012. Some have predicted that this heralds the end of mankind. The novel uses this premise as the basis for a thriller/science fiction adventure. In a Miami mental asylum inmate Michael ‘Mick’ Gabriel has spent the last eleven years incarcerated in solitary confinement for attacking a politician. He forms a relationship with the new psychiatric intern, Dominique Vazquez, who is assigned to care for him. As she gets to know him, she learns about his unconventional upbringing in South America. Mick was raised by his archaeologist father, Julius, amongst the ancient ruins of the Mayan culture. Julius, having spent decades researching the Mayan’s lost history, firmly believed that…

One of the great things about running your own book review website is that you can write about whatever books you want. I have written reviews for a fair number of new releases so far this year so I decided, for a bit of a change of pace, that I would revisit some of the novels that I read as a teenager. Over the coming months, I plan to do a few of these types of posts. I’m keen to cast my jaded adult eyes over some titles to see if they still have the same resonance now as they had then.  Hopefully, if nothing else, this may introduce some new readers to fiction that they may not have experienced before. Have the books survived the ravages of time? Do they still have something to offer? Do I still feel the same way about them as I did before? High above London, on the rooftops of the city, lives a secret society of misfits governed by a bizarre code of honour. It is a world known to only a few people on the streets below – until the murderous battle for its leadership breakout. The first novel I have selected…