KCR: The Intruders (novel) by Stephen Coonts

Cover of The INTRUDERSThe Intruders continues the career of Stephen Coonts' favorite character, Jake "Cool Hands" Grafton. After end of Vietnam War, Grafton was assigned to a carrier mainly training jarheads (US Marines) flying Intruders, and he's paired up with a marine, and together, they have all sorts of adventures on and off the carrier. It ends with an encounter against a bunch of pirates.

This is more of an adventure novel than a military novel, as there isn't much fighting. However, Coonts knows his carrier ops, and this has more stories about carrier ops, shore leave, and stuff, plus the jokes, the friendly joshing between Navy and Marines, and more.

If you read Flight of the Intruder, you should also read The Intruders.

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KCR: Flight of the Intruder (novel)

Flight of the Intruder by Stephen Coonts is the novel he had written, but can't find a publisher for years. When Tom Clancy managed to get his "Hunt for Red October" published, suddenly Coont's novel found an outpet.

Coonts is not a bad writer, but you can tell this is his first novel. A lot about "Jake Grafton" is almost autobiographical, describing Coonst, and characterization is a bit lacking. You don't really get a sense of what exactly drives Jake Grafton. it is as if he's just floating through life, not sure of what he wants, while doing some of the most dangerous activities on earth: being a naval aviator on a US Navy Carrier, and he's good at it.

The flying scenes are very good, but the plot is a bit of contrived high concept: what if we really bombed Hanoi... once?

It is worth reading, if you want to learn about life as naval aviator.

And skip the movie. It's a rather lousy adaptation.

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KCR: The Assassin (novel, terrorism)

Image via WikipediaThe Assassin by Stephen Coonts is a finely crafted tale of wit-matching between Adm. Jake Grafton (ret.) and his team, including the narrator Tom Carmellini, former thief, now CIA "spy", against the Al Qaeda lead by Abu Qasim. Abu Qasim had nearly destroyed the G8 meeting last time. When a group of the wealthiest industrialists in the world pooled their resources to help curb terrorism, they became targets of Abu Qasim. Carmellini was sent to infiltrate the plot and his focus was on Marisa Petrou, daughter-in-law to one of the industrialists in danger... but she just may be Abu Qasim's daughter... Whos is on which side? And what is Abu Qasim's ultimate target?

Stephen Coonts is an amazing writer. His first book: Flight of the Intruder, was one of the best books on Vietnam War and Naval Aviators available ever written. He had followed up with several books, with Grafton turned into a spy master matching wits with terrorists and such. The characters are detailed, and the motivations make sense. The whole novel reads like a mystery, as you peel back one layer, then another, then another, while you consider false leads (red herrings) and misdirections, and so on. Carmellini is an interesting narrator (this wasn't his first appearance) as he's a former "bad guy" turned to the side of light. He is not a nice nice person, but he will do the right thing when given a choice.

The only problem I have with this book is it is sometimes very "slow" as you are confused as to which way the plot is going, but that is a part of the tension and unease, and part of the charm.

Rating: read it at least once