Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Manifest Destiny by Rick Robinson

Congressman Richard Thompson's good friend and one of his staffer's go to Romania to observe the Presidential election. The staffer is kidnapped the first night and Thompson and his wife travel to help find him and bring him home. Before they leave though, the Mace of the House of Representatives is stolen. While Thompson is in Romania his friend the Fat Man looks into the disappearance of the Mace. Agent Jane Kline is assigned to help Thompson find his staffer Josh Barkman. They hear that they car Barkman was taken away in is an old car of Richard Nixon's and know that it will not be hard to find. They go into the mountains to the home of General Gheorghe Alexandro who took the car when the government of Nicolea Ceausescu fell. Thompson winds up doing things he never thought himself capable of and has to keep it all to himself.

The storyline was a good one, however it seemed disjointed in places to me. There was so much going on that sometimes it overwhelms the plot. Although all was resolved in the end, it was hard getting there. This was not a fast read for me, in fact it took several days to get through. It did not keep my interest and I was not sure I was going to like it. However, in the end it was a nice story. Richard Thompson seemed like a typical politician. The stand out characters for me were Jane Kline and Michael Griffith. Griffith didn't really care what anyone thought of him, but he changed as the book went on. Jane Kline was a take charge woman and didn't take any guff from anyone. As I said before the story just did not flow smoothly for me, but was overall a good one. I did love the cover with the top of the Mace on it. However the Mace was not the central part of the story.

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