Product Description

July 4th weekend, New York City:As thousands of holiday travelers make their way out of Manhattan, a flawlessly executed terrorist attack plunges the city into a maelstrom of panic and death. Amidst the chaos, an elite team of foreign soldiers is systematically searching for one of their own, a man so powerful that the U.S. government refuses to admit he even exists and will do anything to keep him hidden. Now, with the world's deadliest enemy upon America's doorstep, counterterrorism operative Scot Harvath must fight his way through the burning city streets to take down an invisible terrorist mastermind with the means to unleash hell on a global scale.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #12786 in Books
• Published on: 2007-05-22
• Released on: 2007-05-22
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• 464 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9781416505426
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

From Publishers Weekly
More terrorist-whupping kicks off Thor's latest addition to his series (Blowback, etc.) featuring Scot Harvath, covert counter terrorism operative for the Department of Homeland Security. Harvath abducts an Algerian bomb-maker out of Montreal while another U.S. team snatches Mohammed bin Mohammed (a.k.a M&M), head of al-Qaeda's weapons of mass destruction committee, from Somalia and stashes him in a secret facility in New York City. But Harvath's premonition that the next terrorist attack would make "9/11 look like choir practice" comes true when Al-Qaeda operative Abdul Ali, backed by a three-foot-tall freelance intelligence agent known as "the Troll," goes to New York to rescue M&M. As part of the al-Qaeda rescue attempt, the Big Apple comes under furious attack. The U.S. president's daughter is seriously injured and thousands are slain as Harvath and his team chase a ruthless enemy through the devastated streets and subways. Bullets fly, bombs explode and people die. Back in Washington, to the disgust of the president, cowardly bureaucrats mewl and whine. Despite stock characters and just-get-the-job-done writing, hawkish readers may relish the non-stop action, lethal weapons, flag waving platitudes and outrageous American-on-terrorist torture. Others may have no stomach for Thor's vision of a U.S. that has dispensed with rule of law to deal with "bad guys...always probing for another soft spot they could exploit."
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

About the Author
Brad Thor, a graduate of the University of Southern California, has served as a member of the Department of Homeland Security's Analytic Red Cell Program and is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Lions of Lucerne, Path of the Assassin, State of the Union, Blowback, Takedown, The First Commandment, The Last Patriot, and The Apostle. Visit his website at www.BradThor.com.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Djemma el-Fna Market

Marrakech, Morocco

May 11

The problem with being in the wrong place at the wrong time is that you never know it until it's too late. That's how it was for Steven Cooke, and the bitter irony was that right up to the very last moment of his life, he thought he had stumbled upon an intelligence jackpot.

The blond-haired, blue-eyed twenty-six-year-old had happened across the meeting completely by accident. In fact, Cooke wasn't even supposed to be in that part of town except that his sister had asked him to bring her a special caftan when he flew home for a long-overdue visit at the end of the week.

Although he had way too much work to do before leaving, Steven had always found it hard to say no to Allison. The two were more than brother and sister. They had been best friends since childhood. In fact, Allison was the only person who really knew what he did for a living. Even their parents had no idea that their son was a CIA field officer.

Steven had been in Morocco just under a year and had gotten to know Marrakech fairly well. The souk at the heart of the small city was a labyrinth of passages and narrow alleyways. Donkey carts laden with merchandise lumbered up and down the hot, dusty thoroughfares, while the ever-present haze hung so thick that neither the city's mud-brick walls nor the high Atlas Mountains off in the distance could be seen from the main square. The heat was absolutely insufferable and as he combed the various covered markets for the perfect caftan for Allison, Cooke was grateful for the shade.

It was when Steven took a shortcut through one of the alleys that he noticed an unremarkable café with a rather remarkable patron -- a man who had disappeared two days before the September 11th attacks and for whom the United States had been searching ever since.

If he was correct, his discovery would represent not only a major coup for American intelligence, but it might also place a very distinct feather in his cap and set him apart as one of the more distinguished young field operatives. That would be nice, though Cooke reminded himself that he had joined the CIA to help defend his country, not to rack up attaboy's.

Removing his cell phone, Steven contacted his supervisor and filled him in on everything he had seen, including a mysterious new player who had entered the café and was now sitting at their man's table. With no one close enough to provide support, the best his boss could do was request the retasking of one of their surveillance satellites to help gather additional intelligence. The lion's share of the operation would fall to Steven. There were a staggering number of question marks surrounding the man in that café and the CIA needed Steven to gather as much information about him and what he was up to as possible.

Though adrenaline, fear, and excitement were coursing through his bloodstream, Cooke focused on his training to keep himself under control.

The first thing Steven needed was a record of the meeting. Since there was no way he was going to show his white Anglo-Saxon face in that café and potentially scare away his quarry, he had to get his hands on a fairly decent camera. Moving through the marketplace as fast as he dared, he finally found what he was looking for. The only problem was money -- he didn't have enough of it. The souk pickpockets were notorious, and he never carried credit cards and definitely never any more cash than he knew he would need. What he did have, though, was his Kobold Chronograph wristwatch, and the shop owner gladly accepted it in exchange for a Canon digital camera with a fairly decent zoom lens and an extra-high-capacity memory card.

From the edge of a rooftop across the alley, Steven interspersed his picture-taking with pieces of short video he hoped the experts at Langley would be able to decipher. Whatever had drawn the man in the café out of hiding must have been extremely important for him to risk this meeting.

Steven filled the high-capacity memory card and was about to reinsert the low-end factory-included card to see if he could get any pictures of the man's car once he left the café, when he heard a noise behind him.

The garrote wire whistled through the air and then snapped tight around his neck. Steven's hands scrabbled uselessly for it as he felt a knee in his back and the pressure begin to build. When his trachea severed, the camera clattered onto the rooftop, cracking the screen.

The damage made no difference to the assassin as he dragged the lifeless young CIA operative back from the parapet and pocketed the camera as well as the spare memory card. The only thing Abdul Ali cared about was that there never be any record of the meeting in that café.

The Americans would know its outcome soon enough, and by then it would be too late.

Copyright © 2006 by Brad Thor

Customer Reviews

"The war on terror is not working."
Brad Thor's "Takedown" focuses on the conflict between Islamic extremists and their enemies in the west. Mohammed bin Mohammed is al-Qaeda's master bombmaker as well as the head of its committee on weapons of mass destruction. An American covert action team kidnaps Mohammed from his hiding place in Somalia and brings him to a secret location in New York City. Abdul Ali, a man implicated in a number of terrorist attacks and high-profile assassinations, is determined to get Mohammed back. He enlists the aid of a villainous dwarf known as the Troll to put together an extraction team to rescue Mohammed.

Meanwhile, thirty-six year old Scot Harvath, a former Navy Seal and counterterrorism operative for the Department of Homeland Security, crosses the border into Montreal to nab Sayed Jamal, an Algerian-born terrorist. Although Scot is a patriot, he has grown tired of the red tape and secrecy that hamper his ability to carry out his job. In addition, Scot would like to have a personal life and start a family someday, but as long as he continues to travel all over the world on highly secret missions, his time will never be his own.

Soon, terrorists stage a series of attacks on the infrastructure of New York City. Besides claiming many innocent lives, these attacks insure that all of the major emergency services are tied up with search and rescue missions. Meanwhile, Abdul Ali and his hired band of fierce Chechens are busy with a mission of their own--to find the place where Mohammed bin Mohammed is being held and bring him to safety.

This novel features enough explosions, weaponry, and chase scenes to please any action-adventure junkie. The villains are merciless fiends who commit unspeakable acts in an effort to bring the United States government to its knees. The author implies that America is currently losing the war on terror. As long as there is bureaucratic infighting and too much emphasis on the rights of suspected terrorists, Thor seems to be saying, America will be unable to defeat al-Qaeda. The book's epigraph is "exitus acta probat": "the ends justify the means."

"Takedown" has an enormous cast of characters, including former soldiers who accompany Harvath on his quest to stop Abdul Ali. One of them, Tracy Hastings, was maimed when a bomb that she was trying to defuse in Iraq accidentally detonated. Tracy and Scott form a bond that soon blossoms into romance. At almost four hundred pages, the book goes on a bit too long and is so frantically busy that there is little room for character development. However, its courageous heroes and "ripped from the headlines" plot will undoubtedly earn "Takedown" a receptive audience among fans of contemporary thrillers.

Another Great Book
Well, I bought this book last Saturday, promptly laid down the current book I was reading, and started to read "Takedown". It took me about 2-1/2 days to finish it and I have to say it was great. Definitely one of the best action/thrillers out there. I have read all five of Brad's books and would place this one as number 2 (Lions being #1).
I have read other authors to include Vince Flynn, David Baldacci, John Grisham, Dan Brown, Tom Clancy, Alex Kava, Clive Cussler, Robert Ludlum, Ken Follett but my top two favorites have to be Brad and Vince. Both are awesome military style/good guy writers and I highly encourage everyone to read both authors books. I anxiously await Scot Harvath's next adventure and hope he avenges the death of someone (I won't ruin the story for those who haven't read it) at the end of Takedown.
To a previous reviewer, I don't think it was the Troll who is the murderer but someone else who Scot knows.

Hard to put down
In regard to the poison pen reviewers, who seem to infest Amazon like fleas on a dog (and write reviews using psuedonyms), I would note that you should read an entire novel before attempting to review it. Some novels start out slow, but the action builds up. This one kept me up late.

The author has written a great action filled novel. United States agents capture an international terrorist in Somalia, using a covert operation, and take him to a location in New York City. In the meantime, Scot Harvath has been on a secret operation in Canada to capture another terrorist, also taken to New York in a covert operation.

Terrorists mount a massive suicide mission against New York City to try to free the terrorist mastermind, needed to complete evil plans. Harvath finds himself on the scene, mounting a counter operation using a team put together on the spot including an old friend. Events are complicated by a lack of cooperation between agencies, and the fact that there is a mole somewhere aiding the enemy.

Then there is the information source known as the Troll, playing all sides for his own profit. Everyone has their own agenda, some of which are not obvious to the players in the game.

The white hats eventually win this round, but at a high price. The Troll is still out there, and an unknown enemy is stalking Harvath. Final events set things up for a sequel.