HELLDIVER
5 out of 5 stars: Helldiver? Hell yes. Intelligent intel and action — the best yet from Chris Allen's INTREPID.
One of the things I love most about Chris Allen’s writing is this; he isn’t content to stay in one gear, with a main character and peripherals who remain static, content with a shoot-em up status quo. It would be easy for Alex Morgan and the rest of the INTREPID team to have the same adventures in each new book, but Allen takes them further each time, investigating uncomfortable social topics whilst delivering bang-on Bond worthy thrills, spills, and spook-filled travails.
In HELLDIVER, possibly his tightest plotted effort yet, Morgan and his now familiar offsider Elizabeth Reigns are thrown into the immense riches and pleasure state of the oligarchs, Russia’s new world order. Wielding more power than Rasputin and Stalin combined, Morgan learns that his new enemies ‘live by the sword’, and he quickly sees “that the old ways were never really old at all: they were a constantly evolving beast that never aged, never weakened, never relented”. Fighting time, internal enemies and exterior brute force, Morgan has to call on all his wit, tenacity and warrior skills to survive - and save those he cares for.
I am a massive Len Deighton fan, and to me, there is quite a bit of Deighton’s wry deftness in Allen’s writing. Much like Deighton and other champions of the classic spy thriller, such as le Carré and Ludlum, Allen’s ability to connect with his audience comes not only from the action scenes but from the ‘inbetweeners’ - the subtle throwaway lines. Watch out for the last few pages, because if, like me, you are a bit of a war geek, you will also be off to Vegas at the mention of Jane’s (this does not impact on the plot, and will make sense. Promise).
The verdict of Alex Morgan’s latest outing? Majorly good derring-do, from a man who has done both the derring AND the do - and it shows. Helldiver? Hell yes.