The fifth Patrick Bowers thriller, “The Queen”, by Steven
James, careens through a Wisconsin winter like
a snowmobile at full throttle. James
starts our protagonist on a case related to his old nemesis, Richard Basque,
then changes gears as Pat Bowers is assigned to a seemingly unrelated side-case
that acquaints him with a new conflicted nemesis, Alexei Chekov.
For those who love high tech adventures and suspense, this
book stands toe-to-toe with the best Clancy novels. From Agent Bowers’ geospatial three
dimensional profiling program, ELF (Extremely Low Frequency) transmission
technology for submarine contact, to the behind-the-scenes experimental
government technologies used by spy agencies and Eco Terrorism, this book has
it all.
James does an excellent job at balancing the thrills with
deep character development where we dig into Agent Bowers’ past with an introduction
of his brother and sister-in-law, Sean and Amber. Bower’s complicated relationship with his
daughter Tessa creates a nice tension with an underlying question of what
forgiveness and reconciliation mean. Did
Pat Bowers and his on-again, off-again love interest Lien-hua Jiang finally get
around to tying the knot? You’ll have to
read the book to find out.
Having read the past four Patrick Bowers novels, I am always
expecting the unexpected twists at the end and “The Queen” didn’t
disappoint. This is required reading for
adrenaline junkies!
“Available September 2011 at your favorite bookseller from
Revell, a division of Baker Publishing Group.”
