This is a reasonable story, though a number of times I thought it was a bit too far fetched. Especially the fact that hero Alex Cross's Arch enemy Kyle Craig, with a new face and identity is working alongside him during the case.

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This book covers a period of history during the American war of Independance. A small British force occupies a small peninsula in Maine called Majabigwaduce. A much larger American force arrives on huge armada of ships to try and dislodge the British. The British are still trying to complete the fort and thier commander is just going to put up a token resistance to avoid bloodshed. However the superior American force fails to seize the initative and eventually is forced to retreat.

I found the whole book very slow without really strong characters and not as good as other Cornwell books I have read.

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I have read many John Grisham novels and this one was OK. The plot was believable to a point, that a crooked Oil Tycoon would have two US Supreme court judges assasinated, so that judges more favourable to his forthcoming case would be appointed. Law Student Darby Shaw discovers the reasons for the assasinations are linked to the clearing of the Louisiana wet lands, including the Pelicans to allow oil drilling to be undertaken. She writes the Pelican Brief which finds its way to all departments in Washington Via her Lawyer boyfriends contacts. He gets blown up in his car which Darby would have been in had she not just had an argument with him. The the tycoon then stops at nothing to silence Darby. She then has many narrow sometimes harldly believable escapes as the book meanders to its conclusion. At the end of the day I found the book alright but not one of John Grishams best. Still worth reading though.

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As I like all aspects of history I found this book very interesting. The author tells the story of the siege of Constantinople in 1453 by the Turks. He uses well researched historical facts and real characters who featured in the seige such as Count Longo the Genovese and Sultan Memed the Turk. Other characters he has created fit in well with the story. The Turks eventually got into the city through the Kerkoporta gate and the author leaves it a mystery as to who opened the gate, as historically no one knows the answer to that question.
I enjoyed the book so much that I want to visit Istanbul soon and stand on top of the walls to look out at the place where Memeds army once stood.

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This is an excellent well researched historical novel, that follows the lives of five families in Wales,Germany,USA and Russia before, through and after the First World War. His description of life in a Welsh mining village and down the coal pit in the early 20th centuary was gritty and clearly described.As the First world war progresses all the main male characters are drawn into this and you see the war from the British,German,Russian and US perspective which was interesting. I think the German who doubled as a diplomat and a Major a the front got a little far fetched at times, but that would be my only criticism of a very engrossing book which I enjoyed thoroughly. I am glad it is part of a trilogy and I look forward to see what hapens to the strong characters as the 20th centuary progresses.

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I have read some other Ian Rankin books in his Rebus series and they are OK. I found the story line in the Complaints pretty thin. The plot is very complicated and the characters not that great. Some even have similar names and you have to think who is he talking about. Broughton or Brogan. It ambles along with not very much happening. The main character Inspector Malcolm Fox is a reformed alcoholic. So his life is going to be pretty dull for starters. The ending is just as flat as the start and middle of the book and not worth the effort of reading 452 pages to get to.

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In this book Dirk Pitts kids the heros escape certain death many times. One of these times they managed to cut through steel shackles as the tide was rising with... A nail file! I think Mr.Cussler really is taking the Mickey here. His portayal of the Japanese crane driver in Yokohama may seem OK if you know nothing of Japanese dockers and the docks in Yokohama. However I have been running to those docks for 30 years on ships so found his characters ridiculous. Finally he talks about the hijackers having AK 74s. Shouldnt it be AK47 !
Give this book a miss there are much better books out there to read.

Shadow on the Moon