Great!!!!!! | Silent Thunder | Iris Johansen, Roy Johansen

Full Speed Ahead Action Tale | Silent Thunder | Iris Johansen, Roy Johansen

books:


	• Silent Thunder Iris Johansen, Roy Johansen St. Martin's Press, 2008 - 416 pages average customer review:based on 11 reviews view larger image
	for more information click here

A page turner with all the elements an espionage junkie could want

Just because the Cold War is over doesn't mean that fans of that era's international thrillers (think le Carré, Clancy) can't find a good read. In SILENT THUNDER, Iris and and Roy Johansen don't let the end of United States/Soviet tension stand in the way of a top-notch espionage yarn set in both the U.S. and the former USSR.

Iris Johansen writes bestselling suspense fiction, and her son, Roy, has won the prestigious Edgar Award. Between them they have crafted a page turner with all the elements an espionage junkie could want:

* A brilliant and beautiful heroine (marine researcher Hannah Bryson)
* A mysterious stranger, Kirov, who may be Hannah's best shot --- or her last mistake
* A Russian submarine (the decommissioned Silent Thunder)
* An evil mastermind (the ruthless Pavski)
* Fabled buried treasure (the Czech Golden Cradle)
* A corrupt congressman blackmailed into playing with the bad guys
* A shady CIA operative who keeps his eye on the prize
* Imperiled children (Hannah's niece and nephew)
* Undertones of a dangerous romance between Hannah and Kirov
* A beautiful ex-KGB agent, Eugenia, who hasn't lost her touch, or her fondness for Kirov

While all the requisites are there, SILENT THUNDER never moves into cartoonish territory, and the action and characters are strong enough so that, as in all good fiction, we suspend our disbelief.

The adventure begins when Hannah is hired to examine the Silent Thunder. Once the pride of the Soviet submarine fleet, Silent Thunder has been acquired by a museum in Boston, and Hannah's job is to make sure that every inch is safe for the public. She and her brother, Connor, set about checking out the sub and discover some mysterious plates with incomprehensible signals etched in. Could they be important? An explosion on the ship that causes Connor's death answers that question. The plates are important to any number of people. But why? What do they mean? Connor's wife, Cathy, was a player in Washington, and she's still well connected. Cathy and Hannah determine to avenge Connor's death, but finding the responsible party means getting involved with a variety of shady characters.

Pavski, a crazed Czech determined to find the fabled Golden Cradle, apparently believes that the plates hold the secret to its location. Kirov, a mysterious Soviet who faked his own death (or did he?), wants to get his hands on Pavski for his own reasons and isn't above using Hannah as bait. Bradworth, who works for the CIA, also wants Pavski and isn't very free with information, leaving Hannah and Cathy wary of trusting him.

To Pavski and Kirov, Hannah is more afterthought than protagonist; she will serve her purpose, and what happens to her doesn't matter. To Hannah, finding the secret of the plates, and making Pavski accountable for her brother's death, are paramount. Trying to decipher the code on the plates is risky and complicated, involving a brilliant Soviet mathematician, a working knowledge of Greek mythology, a smuggler with precious few scruples, a master bomb maker with even fewer, and a dangerous jaunt around the Czech Republic for Eugenia.

Everybody is trying to stay one step ahead of the other; a mistake can, and for some does, mean death. Eventually, even Connor and Cathy's children face the threat of death as an increasingly desperate Pavski pulls out all the stops.

And SILENT THUNDER does pull out all the stops until a conclusion in which some are damned and others are redeemed.

--- Reviewed by Pat Morris

for more information click here

Great!!!!!!

This book is realllllllly good! The story line keeps you interested. I've read all of Iris Johansen's books and one of Roy's. They write very well together. I hope they keep coming with more.

Full Speed Ahead Action Tale

Iris Johansen fans know her for the Eve Duncan suspense thrillers and for the blistering reads she delivers with every book. I have to mark time on my calendar to sit down with a new book because I know I won't want to have to get up. SILENT THUNDER proved to be another grab-you-by-the-throat dash that pulled me along on a frantic chase for a deadly puzzle piece.

Although novelist Roy Johansen teamed up with his mother for this one, I couldn't tell much difference. Evidently Mom's taught son a lot of her moves and he can step right in without missing a beat.

I was intrigued by the choice of subject matter in the novel. I wouldn't have figured the author for having any real interest in or knowledge of nuclear submarines, but they obviously did their homework and had worked out they wanted to do. Johansen has researched many fields for her books, so this one shouldn't have come as a surprise.

Hannah Bryson is an architect specializing in marine vessels. Her work on the TITANIC brought her to national attention and catapulted her career into an international theater. The work she was doing on SILENT THUNDER, a decommissioned Soviet-era nuclear attack submarine, was supposed to be a short gig and didn't involve anything big. She finds out too late that the mystery and danger that followed the submarine and its commander through the last years of the Cold War haven't been completely eroded by time. That lesson costs Hannah more than she ever would have risked had she known.

Now, instead of walking away from a simple job, Hannah goes over the submarine with a fine-toothed comb and ferrets out crumbs of the much larger secret held within the craft. On the run for her life, not knowing exactly who she can trust, Hannah seeks revenge on the people that brought pain into her life.

As usual, Iris Johansen's characters are a little on the thin side, but evolving them any more would have slowed the breakneck pacing that moves from event to event and from locale to locale. She writes books that hammer her readers with curiosity and tension, driving them to keep turning pages.

My wife and I both read this one and enjoyed it a lot. The characters were fun, and we didn't mind Hannah's superhuman photographic memory (though she and I haven't met anyone with that ability yet). And we both stayed with the book until we turned the final pages. That's about the best compliment a reader can offer an author.

Roy Johansen is an established, Edgar Award-winning author in his own right, and Iris has delivered a steady stream of NEW YORK TIMES bestsellers. Iris usually writes a couple novels a year, one of them sometimes featuring series regular Eve Duncan. It'll be interesting to see if mother and son continue to write together, but if they do, they've definitely got a winning blend.

for more information click here

Number-one bestselling author Iris Johansen teams up with Edgar Award winner Roy Johansen and the result is an explosive, tour-de-force thriller. . . . It was the assignment of a lifetime. . . . Brilliant marine architect Hannah Bryson has been given the job of a lifetime. A U.S. maritime museum has just acquired the decommissioned Soviet submarine Silent Thunder for public exhibition. It?s Hannah?s job to make sure that every single inch of the legendary nuclear attack sub is safe for the thousands of visitors anticipated. Enlisting the aid of her brother, Connor, they examine the enormous vessel and delve into its long---and lethal---history. But is it really a trap? In the course of their investigation, Connor discovers a mysterious message behind one of the ship?s panels. But before he can figure out what it means, there?s a deadly assault on Silent Thunder. . . . Though the U.S. government tries to warn Hannah away, she?ll stop at nothing to find the ruthless mastermind behind her brother?s death. Even if it means joining forces with a mysterious man who may be even more dangerous than the enemy she has sworn to bring down. As Hannah finds herself in the crossfire of an epic standoff, her only hope for survival is to unravel the sub?s explosive secret. But someone?s willing to kill to make sure Silent Thunder stays silent. . . . Brisk, exhilarating, and filled with authentic details, Silent Thunder is what you get when you team the biggest name in suspense with the stunning plot twists of an Edgar Award--winning author. Get ready for a page-turning thrill ride!

for more information click here

reviews: page 1, 2, 3