Once, when I picked up a book from the local library, the librarian asked to tell her what I thought about the book when I would bring it back. Well, why not write a few lines about all the books I read so everybody could see what I thought about it? I'm often also happy to have friends recommend a certain book or tell me this and that is not really worth reading. I won't comment about the tons of books I have read so far, but about books I read from now on.
| highly recommended | sehr empfohlen | |
| good reading | gutes lesematerial | |
| average | durchschnittlich | |
| not too interesting | nicht allzu interessant | |
| recommended not to read it | empfehlung das buch nicht zu lesen |
 |
|
|---|---|
| title | The Second Saladin |
| author | Stephen Hunter |
| ISBN-10 | 0-440-22186-2 |
| ISBN-13 | 978-0-440-22186-9 |
| ASIN | |
| rating | |
| date | 2010-Jan-23 |
Paul Chardy is an ex-CIA agent. In his time he was a star, one of the tough and successful cowboys out in the field but also somewhat controversial due to his famous temper. Years after his less than glorious dismissal a situation builds up where the CIA wants to get him back. He is the only one who has ever seen the face of the man they fear. Chardy's last operation, which went belly-up comes back to hunt him. But he finally also learns what exactly went wrong.
The first half of the book is mildly interesting, though far from splendid. Then things worsen and some parts get quite chatty without saying anything or bringing the story any further. Obviously Hunter wants to make the reader feel the situation the characters are in by describing their thoughts and reasoning, but all he succeeds in is to create some boredom. Then, in the last quarter of the book things pick up but unfortunately they disintegrate quite a lot. Characters in the story know where to look for the villains out of the blue, they find some good guys offhand in the Mexican mountains even though the last time they heard of them was before they ran into the mountains etc. It feels very much as if the manuscript had been sitting on the desk for weeks and now, due to some kind of deadline a desperate attempt was made to bring it to an end, somehow.
