Primary Objective

Theta Warrior Series, Book 1

By: William D. Horton

Narrated by: Paul Burt

Length: 3 hrs and 49 mins

Publisher's Summary

The gang wars in Chicago makes it a war zone. A Navy SEAL's ultimate mind control training is reactivated, and he is off on a mission no one can stop. He is on a nonstop program to eliminate the gang problem by the very violence they use, but mush better. A one-man killing machine trained by the world's best. 

On the other side of the tracks, a truck pulled up, its lights shining in Jerry’s eyes. His car purred with the sound of ocean waves from the tape. The white lights of the truck suddenly flashed as rail cars passed, and the red lights sent warning signals.

First thinking that the reflections in his car resembled a disco, he focused on the tape, the visual show encompassing him. He forgot the pain in his leg, he forgot how close he was to home. Halfway between sleep and awareness, like dozing on the Interstate with only stars and dividers to keep a driver’s attention, he stared someplace in between the flashing white and red lights, hearing only the sounds of wave after wave hitting an invisible shore.

He felt a familiar mode of relaxation, something he’d been trained to do in the service, so this wasn’t new to his brain, but it sure was a welcome stranger. Mentally, he felt alert...aware. But the flashing light took on the effect of a strobe light, pulsing deep to the back of his brain.

When Jerry snapped to consciousness, he was alert to the voice of the president. He listened intently to what seemed like instructions. In fact, he knew these were instructions. Somehow, he’d been called back on a mission. Somehow, they knew he was here on this empty road. He looked where the tape should have played while he listened to the president say, “We have a war we must declare.” The tape had ejected at the end, which they were built to do even on a manual playback recorder. The president continued, “Not only abroad does this war rage, but here in this nation, on our streets, and it is up to you, to me, to us all to make sure we win this war at any cost. To lose the war on drugs is more than our nation can afford to pay.”

Johnson didn’t know why, but he remembered how the Theta training worked. He remembered everything. The president listed events that had happened over the past 30 years and how we have made some improvements, but most of the time, nothing had happened. The drug problem in the United States was tearing the moral fiber of the country. He said that while every president since the 1960’s have all given lip service to the war on drugs reclaiming America’s streets, nothing much had actually been accomplished. The current drug industry was the most profitable, strongest, and the most violent industry this country had ever seen.

Gangs had taken it over. Gangs that made inner cities their battlegrounds. Drive-by shootings were common. Now, it had escalated into drive-by bombings. Terror reigned supreme, and it was moving into the suburbs. “We must defeat this problem of drugs and gangs. Only by defeating the drug empire, by dismantling local street gangs, can we begin to make a dent in the problem. This is a war. The moral equivalent of war. We must make this a primary objective: to stop criminals and dismantle the gangs.” Primary objective.

©1998 William Horton, Psy.D. (P)2020 William Horton, Psy. D.

War on drugs!

We’ve all heard or read about people being hypnotized and/or trained to perform certain activities once they receive a particular trigger word or statement. This is the basis of this novel. Neuro-Linguistic Psychology or Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) therapy is what this technique is called. The goals are to change one’s thoughts and behavior patterns. We follow Navy Seal Petty Officer Jerry Johnson as he obeys his subconscious orders brought to light by an outdated trigger. Prepare for a unique and interesting tale. Is it real? I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

GREAT READ!

I loved it! This book was full of action, drama and suspense. I was introduced to NLP and found it enlightening. The narration was great and kept me entertained. The author did a great job with the character builds and plot! This was my first book by this author but definitely not my last! I look forward to reading more books from this author! I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

OK

Read and listened to quite a few of the author's books.
This one although the story has a lot of potential.
It is in my opinion let down by poor narration. quite annoying accents and voices.

Interesting premise

A bit of a Rambo-style plot of veterans being abandoned and not fitting back into society. There is plenty of action and bloodshed. And, I’m never quite clear who to cheer for (although it is clear who to hate!)

I rarely comment on narrators, but I have to say I didn’t enjoy this one. The voice is very gravelly. That’s a matter of taste though. What I found disturbed the flow of the book were serious mispronunciations of key words - like Annapolis - this happened about once per chapter and was very noticeable.

I received this audiobook for free in exchange for a review.

Friendlies, objectives, expendables.

Jerry Johnson had a small navy pension which he supplemented working in a read and factory job. He missed being in the service, fe!t trapped in self putting drabness, put in a relaxation tale to listen whilst driving instead of the Presidential harangue about the War on Drugs. A train passing in front of him made the headlights of a lorry on the car side of the crossing flash in sequence as the carriages went by. And suddenly he was back, alert but relaxed, a man freed and yearning for action, his mission made clear, given to him by the President. The was on drugs was his primary objective.

Primary Objective is quite a short book, the first in what promises to be an interesting series. It is very fast moving with plentiful helpings of desciptive, quite brutal, action as Jerry takes on the drug gangs and white supremacists in his determination to follow his orders 'whatever it takes' until complete. And through the voices of various other protagonists - police, military, government - it questions what is being and has been done from different perspectives. The writing is effectively sparce, journa!istic, and narration by Paul Burt has a Dragnet quality to it with flipped tone and good modulation, and every character given a distinctive voice. A good performance in keeping with the storyline.

My thanks to the rights holder of Primary Objective who, at my request, freely gifted me with a complimentary copy via Audiobook Boom. Although complete in itself, there is the perfect potential for a book two in the series - one which I will definitely be reading when it becomes available. Thought provoking as well as violent, this is a book to be recommended.