Crumbling Ramparts Review – Jim Bennett (KBR)
In a dystopian USA, Beck takes us on a career of intrigue, daring rescues, personal challenges and the costs of a career on relationships.
Five Stars
Star counts are the most personal, subjective, part of a review. Let me give you a feel for why I like this book so much.
Beck will take you along for a ride with a career Marine officer. You will meet his team, military doctors, and watch him struggle with the problems of a greatly weakened USA. He’s just been screwed for saving his ‘army’ in a difficult retreat. The intrigue goes on from there.
You will watch an al-Qaeda operative plot against our chief protagonist. You will learn how much of the world has changed politically. All of this is done with a masterful interweaving of plots.
The manoeuvering of military politics merges with daring rescue operations. There is plenty of action. The chief protagonist is a veteran problem solver and this increases both his personal power and the loyalty of his command.
I could not put the book down. (I rarely read all of a book this size in one session, but I did it this time.) This is a fine story with adventure, intrigue, politics, relationships, all manner of military hardware and operations. It moves along extremely well.
My personal guidelines, when doing an ‘official’ KBR review, are as follows: five stars means, roughly equal to best in genre. Rarely given. Four stars means, extremely good. Three stars means, definitely recommendable. I am a tough reviewer. I try hard to be consistent. I compared this book to three I read at the shack, where my lost cell phone meant no Internet. Those books were very good. Beck is as good, better, in this work, as any of them. Five stars is an easy decision. Extremely recommended.
Kindle Book Review Team member.