Every Bit as Good as The Templar Legacy - Even Slightly Better!
Amazon says:
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Author: Steve Berry
Title: The Alexandria Link Genre: thriller Fusion works in some settings: the one where I know it works is in the belly of our sun which, to quote the Jimmy Dean sausage commercial, "lights and heats the Earth." It hasn't worked out quite so well in nuclear weapons, and the jury's out on jazz fusion and fusion cuisine (really, now, durian-crusted salmon drizzled with a huckleberry-cinnamon infusion and resting on a bed of okra-chipotle risotto... really, now). But am I alone in believing that fusion truly doesn't work in fiction? Well, perhaps the reason I don't believe it works is that I haven't recently seen it done well. I have recently seen it done quite poorly, however: Steve Berry's The Alexandria Link, which attempts to fuse Dan Brown's The da Vinci Code with anything ever written by Robert Ludlum. "Alexandria" is, of course, the fabled library at Alexandria, Egypt, thought to have been destroyed some time between the first and sixth centuries CE. In keeping with Brownian notions of fiction, however, The Library still exists and has been kept concealed from the hoi-polloi (you and me) for fifteen or so centuries by - you guessed it - a monkish militaristic order that calls itself "the Guardians." The little band, a fusion (there's that word again) of Navy SEALs and ancient history post-docs, act under the direction of "the Librarian" - Nancy Pearl, eat your heart out... Said organization proffers an occasional invitation to a person deemed worthy, although the selection criteria for "worthiness" are rather murky. The "invitee" must solve a series of puzzles (now where have we heard that before!) in a globetrotting version of a treasure hunt - should he solve it, he will gain admission to The Library. What good it'll do him (or her, I suppose) remains unclear. A modern-day organization of the richest people in the world (sounds like the Bohemian Grove) has discovered that the Library still exists and that American ex-spy/lawyer Cotton Malone, now a rare book seller in Denmark, knows where the most recent "invitee" is hiding. That little old man named George Haddad (a Palestinian named "George"?) is the titular Alexandria Link. The Golden Fleece, as the rich-boys' club call themselves, are convinced that The Library holds a secret of world-shaking importance: The Promised Land, ancient Canaan, isn't where Israel lies today: it's actually in Saudi Arabia (yep, right: Mecca is in the real Israel). Imagine the uproar - and the possibilities for profit in the ensuing upheaval. Of course, the rich boys can't find the "link" by themselves, so they involve Malone by the simple expedient of kidnapping his son and sending his shrewish (though hardbodied) ex-wife Pam to get him. Plenty of rootin-tootin', gun-shootin', puzzle-solvin' action ensues. Whoopee. While the Da Vinci Code ripoff action goes on in Europe and the Middle East, Berry layers on an utterly superfluous conspiracy plot thread based in D. C. That's where Malone's ex-boss Stephanie Nelle is found scampering from one near-deadly meeting to another, ducking bullets and bombs with the aid of the beauteous and deadly half-Muslim (I ask you: is "half-Muslim" even possible?) Cassiopeia Witt. What this has to do with Malone's quest for The Library is unclear - oh, it's stated all right, but it still remains unclear... And that means that about a third of the book is pure filler. The other two thirds are just dreck. Berry introduced his protagonist Cotton Malone in the execrable The Templar Legacy, one more in four-year (so far) string of shameless attempts to capitalize on the success of Dan Brown's overblown book of puzzles. That Templar thing was a truly bad book, and this Link thing's no better. Berry's latest is chockablock full of non-stop action almost from the get-go, with plenty of references to Glocks and Berettas, lots of creeping around European cities, and plenty of gun battles in deserted historical sites. All the unnecessary action is presumably the better to disguise the fact that Berry's characters are constructed of papier-mâché and chicken wire and that the plot is thinner than a Motel 6 bath towel. Unlike Brown's and Berry's previous treasure hunt scenarios, this one has only two clues and is, for the most part dirt-simple to solve. Oh, and Berry does introduce a modern twist among his puzzles, with the clue "an address that has no place" - it's a URL! Overall, if you're a fan of mindless reading, hackneyed plots, and cardboard cutouts for characters, then The Alexandria Link is precisely what you're looking for. If you want something with a little meat on its bones, well, there's a book right over there with Fabio on the cover bulging his biceps... And if you want a good book, look elsewhere. all content copyright © 2014 by scmrak
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