The Imam of Tawi-Tawi

Ava has spent two nights luxuriating in a hotel in Yunnan Province with the actress Pang Fai, with whom she has begun a secret relationship. She receives an urgent phone call from Chang Wang, the right hand to the billionaire Tommy Ordonez and one of Uncle’s oldest friends. Years ago, Ava and Uncle helped Tommy recover $50 million in a land swindle.

Uncle Chang asks Ava to fly to Manila to meet with his friend, Senator Miguel Ramirez. Ramirez asks Ava to investigate a college in Tawi-Tawi, an island province in the Philippines, which he suspects is training terrorists. Ava’s investigation leads to a partnership with a CIA agent, and together they attempt to stop an international plot, horrific in size and scope, only to have it turn on them. Ava’s judgment and morals — which Uncle helped her forge — are tested like never before.

The Imam of Tawi-Tawi (International Intrigue)

By Ian Hamilton

Spiderline

ISBN #978-1487002749

Price $10.97 (Paperback)

Price $9.99 (Kindle)

400 Pages

Rating 4-Stars

Uncle Chang Wang calls Ava asking for a favor. A business he and Tommy Ordonez are in with Senator Ramirez in the Philippines are having trouble in Tawi-Tawi, an area heavy populated with Muslims, and the senator feels the Zagat college is training young men for terrorism. The senator connects Ava with a member of the Muslim Brotherhood who will work with her in uncovering the truth. But now that she is no longer in the old business, she no longer has all of her old contacts to access banks. She’s forced to recruit a CIA agent to help here, and this brings American power down on her. She must see the situation through to the end, no matter what the outcome, and her life might even be at stake

I pre-ordered this book, as the synopsis led me to think this would an action-packed adventure with Ava Lee and a CIA agent against a terrorist organization. The writing was still smooth, and the characters interesting, and Ava was very proficient, but I was disappointed in the lack of action. And the Muslims all turned out to be good guys, while the Americans were evil. There is a really big twist at the end, which was nice, but not very logical. The book is called the Triad Years, but this does not include the Triads, though Ava does talk to Xu on the telephone once, so it’s hardly a Triad novel. This is basically Ava Lee and the CIA. Personally, I hope the author brings in more action, if he wants to keep readers following the Ava Lee sagas. She is better than this book shows, in my opinion.

Tom Johnson

Author of THE MAN IN THE BLACK FEDORA

Fever City

The story kicks off in 1960 Los Angeles, with the daring kidnapping of the child of one of America's richest men. It then darts back and forth between a private detective's urgent search for the child, the saga of a notorious hit man in the days leading to JFK's assassination, and the modern-day story of a skeptical journalist researching the still-active conspiracy theories of the 50s and 60s, with the aim of debunking them. Just as the detective discovers that the kidnapping is a crime much larger than he imagined, and the hit man finds himself caught in a web that is astonishingly complex, the journalist discovers-to his horror, dismay, and even his jeopardy-that the conspiracy theories might well be true.

With expert pacing, sparkling dialogue, and plot twists that will keep readers entranced, Tim Baker's irrepressible debut novel is a joy ride through classic noir traditions, updated with a surprisingly contemporary sensibility.

Fever City (Crime Noir)

By Tim Baker

Europa Editions www.europaeditions.com

ISBN #978-1609452872

Price $12.07 (paperback)

400 Pages

Rating 5-stars

“A Fast-Paced, Thrill-A-Minute ride.”

Normally, there are two things I absolutely hate in a story. One is using real people in scenes and narrative, the second is jumping back and forth in the tale from one point to another. This story contains both, but the author pulls it off. The author’s writing is smooth, and he keeps the same people throughout the tale, even if the years jump from 1959 to 1960, 1963, and 2014. It all stems from the kidnapping of the Bannister child in 1960 and the private eye handling the case, to the assassination of JFK in 1963 and one of the assassins hired for the job, and finally culminates with the son of the private detective searching for answers to the mystery in 2014. We are led through conspiracies with Marilyn Monroe, Howard Hughes and the Roswell UFO crash, to secret cabals, the Masons and Illuminati, and hidden temples in the homes of powerful men who control the political system of America and the world.

Two leading questions haunt the tale. First, what became of the missing child, and why are assassins trying to kill the son of the detective, now a reporter, trying to find answers to an old mystery. Everyone the reporter questions turns up dead, and some really weird people are trying to protect him before he meets the same fate. With most of the original people involved now dead, it seems he will not find the answer.

The story comes to an end in France, as the reporter finally learns the truth from one of the main players in this long-running mystery, although I had figured it out early in the story, and if readers will pay attention they will also. But it is certainly a good yarn, even if it does play loosely with real people in history. This book was hard to put down, and kept me turning the pages. Highly recommended for noir lovers.

Tom Johnson

Author of CARNIVAL OF DEATH

The Proxy Assassin By John Koerle

The Proxy Assassin (Spy Thriller)

By John Koerle

ISBN #978-0982090398

Blue Steel Press www.johnknoerle.com

Price $15.00

270 Pages

Rating 5-Stars

“A Slam Bang Finish.”

Former OSS agent Hal Schroeder is back: it’s 1948, and Hal is asked by his CIA contact, Frank Wiser to take on another assignment. This time he parachutes into the Carpathian Mountains in Central Romania to meet up with a group of anti-Communist guerillas, led by Captain Sorin Dragomir. Complicated twists and turns lead to capture, then an odd escape with the help of Princess Stela Varadja. More twists and turns as Schroeder learns that Dragomir is holding Stela’s child, a three-year old boy, the descendent of Vlad Tepes Draculea, and Dragomir’s hope for the future ruler of Romania.

Several plots crisscross in this tale, with throwbacks to the first two stories in this book trilogy, but everything ties together at the end. Throughout the adventure, Schroeder comes close to death many times, and with foreknowledge that this would be the final story featuring Hal Schroeder, I half expected to see his death in a final confrontation with Russian spies.

This has been a fascinating series, and all three stories were great reads. I felt the first story, “A Pure Double Cross,” had the best twist in any story I’ve read since O. Henry, and the sequels were hard-pressed to surpass it, but somehow they succeeded in keeping the series fresh and unique to the spy genre. Readers who expect great action and story telling will find it in the Hal Schroeder novels by John Koerle. A fascinating series to the end.