Book Review by Michael Isenberg.
When we last left Amy Lynn Braxton, at the end of Jack July’s Amy Lynn: Hatchet (2018), the CIA’s badass assassin was handing in her resignation. She made the decision while she was getting out a suitcase to lend to a friend. Her 2½ year old daughter Katherine misunderstands the situation and says, with a heartbreaking expression on her face,
“Momma?...Come home to us.”
Amy Lynn writes her resignation email on the spot. She lets Katherine click the send button. She literally buries the hatchet—the hatchet that not too long before she had planted in the skull of a Nigerian imam who was funding Boko Haram.
By any stretch of the imagination, she has a fairy tale life. Wife of a billionaire, Lady of an Irish castle, with the Duchess of Cambridge on speed dial, she nevertheless stays close to her roots in Black Oak, Alabama. There, in a house within sight of the one she grew up in, she has spent the last three years or so taking care of her brood, which in addition to Katherine is supplemented by a growing number of strays—homeless or abused children she has taken in. It’s a house with love in it. And chicken and biscuits. And Jesus.
And yet, it’s not enough.
Amy Lynn tries to fill the void by becoming assistant coach to the girls’ swim team at her old high school. But it goes badly (at least at first) as she pushes the girls too hard.
Amy’s story—the story of a powerful and independent woman in a world that often feels threatened by powerful and independent women—is mirrored by that of her friend and former colleague Tatiana. But their marriages are very different. While Amy’s husband makes it clear that he’d prefer she didn’t go back to the CIA, there is no doubt he will support whatever she decides, T’s husband isn’t nearly as understanding. When she comes back from a mission with ten staples in her scalp and two broken ribs, she’s dreading the inevitable confrontation. “I know what he’s going to say,” she tells Amy on the phone. “What about your family? Don’t you care about us?...I’m still a warrior, I love it—the thrill, the pain, the fear, surviving when I shouldn’t—you know, the game. When I hang up, I’m going to make a call, tell the truth and then, then, the person who is supposed to love me more than anyone in the world, is going to tell me I’m not a good person because I’m not who he thinks I should be.”
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Rock Star is definitely a book about character development, both for Tatiana and for Amy. But there's still plenty of the hard-hitting action we’ve come to expect from the Amy Lynn series. Action in which those on the wrong side of Ms. Braxton come to painful and blood-soaked ends. And we love it because they totally deserve it. Screw political correctness. Screw lawyers. Screw the police. Well, maybe not the police. Provided they stay out of Amy's way.
Which brings me to the main plotline. |
Sara Marcella Scruggs, aka “Cantrell California,” was the tween star of a popular children’s program on “The House of Mouse.” To paraphrase the disclaimer at the beginning of the book, any resemblance to an actual Disney tween star whose alias ends with the name of a western state is purely coincidental. Now grown up (almost), Cantrell is a selfish, coke-addled, and hugely successful rock singer.
After a private performance in Saudi Arabia, to celebrate the eighteenth birthday of two twin princes, the guests of honor, desperate to impress her, take her on a ride to Mecca—a place where no non-Muslim is permitted. It goes horribly wrong as Cantrell jumps from the car to take a selfie with her tits exposed—within sight of the Kaaba. Arrested, tortured, and raped for days in a Saudi prison, she is released and gotten out of the country thanks to the intervention of the CIA, a really big favor called in by Tatiana, and a heartstopping car chase to the airport.
But the Wahhabi establishment is outraged that the Saudi government allowed Cantrell to escape execution. They decide to take matters into their own hands by calling in one of the world’s most dangerous terrorists, Najm Udeen Barakat, a man with a tragic (and not wholly unsympathetic) past, who lives only to kill Americans. He is so elusive, western intelligence agencies don’t even know what he looks like. They know him only as the Ghost. “You have been chosen by the prophet,” the Grand Mufti tells him. “Go forth and avenge his name.”
There follows an international game of cat and mouse, as Cantrell sets out on a journey of redemption and Najm seeks to track her down and make her pay for her blasphemy. A game that inevitably puts him on a collision course with Amy Lynn Braxton. But is she still up to making the tough decisions that an agent has to make? It remains to be seen.
Amy Lynn: Rock Star is full of twists, mysteries, memorable characters, and suspense that had me turning the pages; I read the whole thing (almost 500 pages) in a day. If you're a longtime Amy Lynn fan, you'll definitely want to catch this installment. If you're new to the series, you should be able to start with Rock Star and follow what's going on. But if you prefer to start at the beginning, here's a review I wrote of 2012's original Amy Lynn.
In the interest of avoiding spoilers, I won’t tell you how things turn out, either for Najm’s mission, or for the various character arcs. But I don’t think it will spoil anything to say that this showed up on the author's Facebook feed the other day:
Can’t wait for Amy Lynn 7!
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Michael Isenberg drinks bourbon and writes novels. His latest book, The Thread of Reason, is a murder mystery that takes place in Baghdad in the year 1092, and tells the story of the conflict between science and shari’ah in medieval Islam. It is available on Amazon.com
Please follow Mike on Facebook and Twitter. Subscribe to Nerds who Read. Photo credit(s): Amazon.com |
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