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Books
_The Cleaner_, Brett Battles
Contemporary action-thriller; the twist is that it doesn't follow the lone assassin or the hunter of same. The protagonist is, theoretically, an auxiliary contractor -- the sort of person who makes sure that the police are paid off, customs has their palms greased, there's a doctor who makes house-calls off the books and for cash, and so forth. Oh, and while he's self-reliant and goes to exotic countries to do dangerous things, he has an apprentice to teach, and was once an apprentice himself.
That premise could have become a much more interesting book than this one.
Instead we get the aforementioned protagonist having a job turn bad, leading in short order to a Bourne-style chase across Thailand and Germany in which he behaves exactly like a lone assassin.
My biggest complaint, however: on four separate occasions, a professional is tailed in a car, and on all four occasions the pro knows what is happening and either loses the tail or explains why he didn't want to do so. The fifth time a professional is tailed -- this time by the Good Guy -- he is oblivious, despite apparently taking the standard precautions of the young and Bondish. A little consistency would be nice.
Contemporary action-thriller; the twist is that it doesn't follow the lone assassin or the hunter of same. The protagonist is, theoretically, an auxiliary contractor -- the sort of person who makes sure that the police are paid off, customs has their palms greased, there's a doctor who makes house-calls off the books and for cash, and so forth. Oh, and while he's self-reliant and goes to exotic countries to do dangerous things, he has an apprentice to teach, and was once an apprentice himself.
That premise could have become a much more interesting book than this one.
Instead we get the aforementioned protagonist having a job turn bad, leading in short order to a Bourne-style chase across Thailand and Germany in which he behaves exactly like a lone assassin.
My biggest complaint, however: on four separate occasions, a professional is tailed in a car, and on all four occasions the pro knows what is happening and either loses the tail or explains why he didn't want to do so. The fifth time a professional is tailed -- this time by the Good Guy -- he is oblivious, despite apparently taking the standard precautions of the young and Bondish. A little consistency would be nice.