First Strike

By: Jack Patterson

Narrated by: Dwight Kuhlman

Length: 5 hrs and 39 mins

Publisher's Summary

Another riveting thriller from award-winning and best-selling author Jack Patterson in a new series about a black ops assassin wreaking havoc on terrorists everywhere.

With ruthless terrorist cells multiplying by the day, the head of the snake must be cut off - and Brady Hawk swings a sharp ax.

Realizing the ineffectiveness of America's own counter-terrorism unit, Texas senator J.D. Blunt proposes a black ops program that's so off the books that only a handful of people know about it. Given the reins and funding to construct his own organization, Blunt creates Firestorm and recruits one of the most effective operatives the American government has ever known: Brady Hawk.

Working with D.C.-based handler Alex Duncan, Hawk learns the location of chief bomb maker for the terrorist group Al Hasib and enters into a race against the clock to eliminate him as well as the man behind the cell before they destroy a key US target.

But that's not all Hawk learns. As the son of the world's most renowned weapons manufacturer, Hawk must also come to terms that maybe his father isn't who he thinks he is - and neither is Blunt.

This pulse-pounding thriller will leave you on the edge of your seat until the very last shot is fired.

©2016 Jack Patterson (P)2016 Green E-Books

a generally entertaining assassin novel

Brady Hawk is an ex-navy seal now serving as a black ops assassin in Afghanistan and Iraq.  He is tasked to take down terrorists quietly, making it look like they were killed accidentally, in hopes of not creating more sympathizers or more terrorists.  The project is led by Senator Blunt, who will do anything to protect his power and pet project, including blackmail and murder.

When Hawk gets captured, he discovers a plot to bomb an American base.  If he can’t escape, kill the bomb maker or warn the US, hundreds will die.  With the help of his handler, Alex, the beautiful ex-C.I.A. operative, he is able to infiltrate deeper into the terrorist network.  Now it is a race for time to foil the plot and stay alive doing it.

There is a fair amount of action, Hawk gets in tight jams, but always escapes with his extraordinary skills and an enormous amount of blind luck.  Unfortunately, the escapes seem forced and way too easy.  The terrorists are easily fooled and bungle their captures.  For example, Hawk fakes an epileptic seizure to get taken to the infirmary, too bad they don’t think to tie him up or post a guard.  Really?

It is an entertaining listen, but doesn’t bring too much originality to a very full genre of military/Muslim extremist/terrorist novels.  The characters aren’t that interesting and tend to get pulled by the plot rather than the other way around.  An easy light read if you enjoy this genre and don’t mind some less than believable escapes.

The story is performed by Dwight Kulman who does a good job.  He has a pleasant voice.  The characters are easily discernible and the voices are pretty good.  His Middle Eastern accents could use a little work but aren’t distracting.  There are production problems at the last third of the novel as chapters are repeated.  An easy fix for the producer, but extremely distracting for the listener as he has to fast-forward to the next chapter to continue the novel.

First Strike is a generally entertaining assassin novel with little to make it standout in a crowded field.

Audiobook was provided for review by the author.

Please find this complete review and many others at my review blog

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4 of 4 people found this review helpful

It was a very slow go.

The author provided me with a complimentary copy of this audiobook in exchange for an honest review. This was a very slow book and frankly if I'd been reading it on my PC or Kindle I'd probably have given up on it before I'd gotten to 30%. It finally got better around 50 or 60%. I don't know if it was just my copy of the audiobook or not but from Chapter 39 to the end of the book each chapter was duplicated. It was really annoying having to listen to the first few seconds of each chapter to confirm it was in fact the same and then scroll to the end of the chapter. If it's the actual recording that is messed up I hope they fix it.

2 of 3 people found this review helpful

Chapters repeated close to end

Good book. But please fix the chapters. They repeat close to the end. Otherwise good book

Not very good with playback issues

I made it through the book but it wasn't great. I've already purchased the second story so I guess I'll give it a chance to see if its any better. Just not a very deep story and you don't really get connected to any of the characters. I was disappointed.

I also had issues with the playback (as someone else mentioned) as it kept repeating chapters and the announced chapter did not match the displayed chapter. weird. Just added to the poor experience