Am on a reading spree of Simon Gervais’ books. I had written the review of The Last Protector almost at the beginning of this month. Have completed reading the next two books in this series and the second book in the Elias series.
The Last Sentinel
Part one of this book starts with some background events that happen in Iran and Iraq when Clayton White was a combat rescue officer and the current Vice President Alexander Hammond was a Lieutenant General. We learn about how as commanding officer of the JSOC, Lt General Hammond had put a target on Major General Mohsen Ashtari of Iran. Clayton White helps in eliminating Major General Ashtari.
Eight years later two tragic incidents happen on the same day. The ship that’s used by Clayton White’s fiancee Veronica Hammond for her climate change research, is attacked at sea. Simultaneously Vice President Hammond and his wife are shot at and the Second Lady is killed. Even though Clayton White and Veronica are estranged from VP Hammond, they both remain close to the Second Lady. Her death hits them hard.
Clayton agrees to help find the attackers in both the incidents and temporary truce is agreed upon.The condition for the truce is that VP Hammond should step down as soon as the attackers are identified.
The rest of the book is about finding Reza Ashtari the younger son of the slain Major General Mohsen Ashtari, who was on a personal “revenge” trip. His elder brother had a different agenda which was to eliminate a close friend of Veronica, the celebrated journalist Emily Moss.
Its fast paced and several different streams of information flow into different chapters.
Finally the “bad” guys are eliminated … “bad” according to the American establishment :):). By a total freak chance VP Hammond becomes the President as the sitting President dies suddenly. So he is unable to keep up his word to White that he will resign. But that is almost forgotten as Veronica announces her pregnancy !
The Last Guardian
In this book, we go across to Macau, Monaco and Switzerland besides some locations in the US. The Fentanyl epidemic has gripped the US and President Hammond wants to eliminate this drug. The reader gets introduced to the Red Dragon Triad and a long term CIA asset who remains under deep cover for almost two decades.
Trafficking of humans, drugs and weapons is big business and this book explores all three. Starts with the drug trafficking stuff and moves into human trafficking and ultimately, everything coalesces into weapons trafficking.
The Chinese get involved as do the Russians. It’s obvious the US doesn’t like China, but China doesn’t care. It’s marching to its own tune (not just in the book, but in real life too). China plans an attack on the U.S. soil, using weapons the U.S. left behind when withdrawing from Afghanistan. Diabolical. All this to make sure that they annex Taiwan with the help of Russia.
In all this the FBI director is killed as is his son, wife and some of the secret service people guarding him.
Ofcourse things don’t end well for some of the characters but Clayton White manages to unravel the plot and bring a lot of the “bad” guys to book.
An excellent fast paced novel as the other two were. The good thing is, even though the main character travels across the three books, you can read them as stand alone books as well.
My rating – 5/5.