An Echo of War

Grant Blackwood

Average Rating 8/10 (2 Reviews)

Dinaric Alps, Bosnian region of Austrian Hungarian Empire, 1918. Four Allied soldiers stumble across a biological weapon that could destroy the world - and take a vow to keep it falling into the wrong hands. Ever since, the deadly substance, code-named Kestrel, has been guarded by the descendents of those four men – each with the mission of keeping its existence a secret.

Chesapeake, Bay, August 2003. The wife of former CIA director Jonathon Root has been kidnapped - and no one except Root himself knows who carried out the crime or why. His father had been one of the soldiers responsible for stealing Kestrel - and now a group of Bosnian terrorists are trying to force Root to hand it over.

Enter agent Briggs Tanner. His mission: follow a trail through the Alps, to the heart of where it all began - before millions of lives are lost.

Review by Chrissi (260204) Rating (7/10)
Review by Alma (130104) Rating (8/10)

Review by Chrissi
Rating 7/10
An Echo of War is the third outing for Briggs Tanner in a thriller in the mould of Jack Higgins. He becomes involved on a personal matter and becomes wrapped up in a case spread across a kidnapping in America and a missing girl in Europe.

The intertwined plots revolve around a deadly biological weapon code named Kestrel hidden during the first world war by a group of men who felt that no-one could be trusted with its assume power. They hid this weapon and swore to keep it safe away from anyone who might seek to use it.

Unfortunately it would appear that either one of the ancestors of those brave men or someone outside their circle now has the secret of the resting place of the weapon and now seeks to find and use it. Ostensibly it is Bosnian terrorists trying to obtain the secret by kidnapping the wife of one of the descendents of the original group, but this man is the former CIA director Jonathan Root.

The book is well written with an interesting plot and neat, tight writing. That it is Tanner’s third outing would indicate that the author is building a following that like his style and are buying his books. It is nice to read books with an established character, and I shall keep an eye out for the previous two books, The End of Enemies and The Wall of Night.

Like Alma, I quite enjoyed the book, it flows well, and although the you will probably guess one of the plot lines, it won’t spoil your reading as you wait to see if you were right or not.
Chrissi (26th February 2004)

Review by Alma
Rating 8/10
An accidentally discovered biological weapon code-named Kestrel is found by a group of four allied soldiers in 1918 who vow to keep it secret to protect the world.

The secret is handed safely from generation to generation for 80 years but now terrorists have kidnapped the wife of former CIA Director Jonathon Root (one of the descendents of the original group of four) to try to force him to release the secret of Kestrel. Briggs Tanner, a former Agent looking for his god-daughter becomes involved and must figure out who it is and how to stop them.

The story is very good with fast moving writing picking up speed towards the twisting climax. The main characters, Tanner and Cahil are reminiscent of Clive Cussler’s characters Dirk Pitt and Al Giordino, inventive and able, they are not easily deterred from their quest. I will certainly be looking out for Grant Blackwood’s previous Briggs Tanner novels The End of Enemies and The Wall of Night.
Alma (13th January 2004)