Trojan

In Trojan we join Andrew Harvey and his girlfriend Sarah Thompson both MI5 agents as they and their team race against time to stop a dirty bomb from going off.If you are familiar with the Tom Gray series by the same author then some of the characters will be like old friends to you, but reading them is not a prerequisite as this is the beginning (hopefully) of a new series and can be read alone.Managing to give us bad guys that have actual character and genuine motivation is what Alan McDermott does really well......no one dimensional baddies here.As Andrew and the team follow every lead and twist and turn they realise they are up against a tactician that may well just be their match!Alan gives you a real feel for the obstacles that a secret service must encounter. ... (First and foremost being secret can be a handicap) that their problems and restrictions feel true to life is a testament to the authors research. ... not that this is a boring procedural or information dump, far from it, it starts with a bang takes in two continents, several countries and gathers pace as it goes....With an ending that was genuinely tense. Hopefully Andrew, Sarah and the team will live to fight another day. A great read from an author at the top of his game.

I read an advance copy of this book and having previously read his Tom Gray books, I loved it. This is a deviation from the series but has some familiar characters and settings. You don't need to have read the others to read this one, and could happily read them later without this being a spoiler should you wish.Thoroughly enjoyed the plot which is set slightly in the future. Some deadly nerve agent has been stolen and the race is on to find it before it is used for a terror attack. As always the pace is fast but unlike many books where you meet so many characters at a time you have to keep checking who is who, Alan is good at making them memorable so you keep track. Set mainly in the UK and Syria, this is a good fast read by a very knowledgeable author.

What a story. It is exactly how I love my action books. A race against time. You hold your breath until the last moment. Of course, you think that the bad guys won't get away with it but in this case, you can never be sure.I think the research was good and all the plots were very realistic. It took me a while to realise how the X3 was transported but I am happy that I guessed (for once) before it was revealed.I loved the side story with Harvey and Sarah. It balanced the fast pace of the book.It is violent at times but never gory.I am surprised Alan McDermott needed to make a disclaimer for the fear of being labelled racist. The fact is, the story is derived from actual events and it could happen.What I have appreciated is that all along the book, he inserted subtle reminders that there is a difference between muslims and fanatic islamists. I think it was very sensibly done.I have loved the Tom Gray's series. It was nice to see familiar names but it would have love to see Tom Gray himself.Well, bottom line, a book that all action readers will love....

Basically you'll probably like this book if you were, like me, an avid watcher of 'Spooks', the TV series. Reminiscent of the series where the top agent's (can't remember which one it was) wife was seconded from MI6. The only difference is that in Trojan they're not married and she's pregnant. As I've seen in some other reviews, there are parts of the book that seem a little contrived in order to allow a certain thread to mature. For example one of the baddies is taken for questioning by some questionable folk using questionable methods, because MI5 only play be the book, and all this is with the Home Secretary's blessing. Why would the Home Secretary allow one branch of the security services to ... er ... question suspects assertively but not the other. On the subject of the Home Secretary, he apparently has an issue with the head of MI5, but it's not clear why.That's why I've dropped a star but I did find that I'd be reading for a lot longer than I thought I had and didn't want to stop when I realised how long it had been.

I'm a big fan of this author's 'Gray' series and was looking forward to this new novel which features a new main character, Andrew Harvey, who appears in the Gray novels and wasn't disappointed. It's an exciting read all the way through and I found myself reading into the early hours because I couldn't wait to see what happened next. I'd thoroughly recommend it to any thriller fan and you don't need to read the 'Gray' novels before this but I would still recommend that you read them at some point as they are brilliant.

If ever there was a totally believable story...if ever there was a book so thoroughly researched...if ever there was a book dealing with the detailed investigations undertaken by our law enforcement agencies, MI5 in particular,...if ever there were such well drawn and realistic characters...if ever there was a plot and sub-plot that was so "real", frighteningly that could actually occur...and if ever there was a genuine "page-turner" that you can`t put down...THEN THIS BOOK IS IT!!I have had the immense pleasure of reading, in chronological sequence, all of Alan`s six books featuring Tom Grey and I can`t wait for the next one, BUT this departure, featuring two characters previously met in the Grey series, Andrew Harvey and Sarah Thompson, both of MI5, gives Tom Grey a "rest" (he is living in Italy) and puts these two `up front` in one of the most thrilling (and I mean that word) books I have ever read. `Trojan` is a totally realistic, un-exaggerated piece of writing which takes the reader right into the action and into the mind-sets of both the criminal protagonists and those whose job it is to stop them.Alan McDermott is an author who maintains excellent top-of-the-table consistency and in my view he is up there with the best of them - and deservedly so! One reviewer has stated that he is Alan`s self-appointed number one fan but I hope he will not mind if I join the number one slot with him.