Smoker A New Level of Suspense…A High Octane Thriller! – Greta L. Hudson –
Bodyguard Atticus Kodiak job is to protect his principle. Assassin John Doe mission is to eliminate his target. A duel ensues when they engage in a battle with conflicting ends. They each play to win. The question is who will be victorious.
Clever plotting and taut pacing kept me souring through the pages. If you’re looking for a rapid-fire thrill ride, this is where you get on. Smoker is in a class all by itself. Atticus Kodiak is compassionate, humble, and damn good at what he does. Definitely someone you want covering your back. Highly recommended.
I’ve read Rucka’s first three novels (Keeper, Finder, Smoker)after reading some of his comic book work. What astounds me about the Atticus Kodiak novels (so far) is there consistency. Atticus is a living breathing person, made more so by his imperfections. I agree with an earlier reviewer that I was screaming “Idiot” as much as I was cheering him on. In this way Rucka’s books are like Owen Parry’s Abel Jones series, as both featuring people who are as close to reality a fictional character can get. You have your disagreements with them, and yet you know at the end of the day you like and respect them, and would be proud to call them friend.
Returning to “Smoker”, I don’t think this is my favorite of the series, but it is still an excellent book. Atticus Kodiak finds himself guarding a key witness against the tobacco industry. While Rucka does make his view of this debate known, it isn’t the primary focus of the novel. Wisely, Rucka focuses on Kodiak’s battle with a master assassin, who hangs over the proceedings like a grim fog; Kodiak knows the assassin is there, but doesn’t know what that person has in store.
While the ending is a little weak, the overall novel is a definite success of tension, suspense, and human conflict, from the battle between killer and protector, on to the mundane interactions of people in their daily lives. Rucka gets it right in ways that certain people in the genre have not. : There is only one way to keep a witness from testifying….
It was supposed to be an easy job: baby-sit a pampered playboy hiding from the angry brothers of an ex-playmate. But someone had forgotten to tell professional bodyguard Atticus Kodiak a few relevant facts. Now Kodiak’s been drawn into the crossfire of a multimillion-dollar game of cat and mouse, guarding a potential victim with an explosive story to tell, and pitted against one of the ten most dangerous assassins in the world. One man is a protector. The other is a destroyer. They have one thing in common. Neither will back down. Each will raise the stakes in a deadly duel of wits and skill where the first player to flinch…dies. The subject is BGs–bodyguards–and Natalie Trent (bred and buttered in the personal security business, where her father, Elliot, is a top player) says to Atticus Kodiak, “You know what a bad reputation BGs have. Most people on the street think a BG is a muscle-bound heavy with mirror shades, undereducated and overarmed.”
Atticus, of course–as readers of Greg Rucka’s explosive and intelligent books about him (Finder and Keeper) already know–is none of the above. He does tend to get involved in running gun battles in heavily populated urban areas, however, and has lost a client or two in a shootout. No wonder the very slick Elliot Trent doesn’t want him as an employee, let alone a son-in-law, in a case involving the protection of an eccentric scientist about to blow the whistle on a giant tobacco company. But Atticus worms his way in anyway–and the results are as exciting and packed with fascinating inside details of the BG trade as ever. Particularly entertaining is a scene where Atticus and Natalie are hired to test the security of a safe house, using everything from unordered pizzas to volleys of tennis balls to irritate the guards. And the presence of a very spooky world-class hired killer known only as John (or Jane) Doe keeps the tension wires at maximum tightness. Another fine performance from a writer ready to move up in weight and class. –Dick Adler
Smoker
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