Who: Robert Doherty (pseudonym for Bob Mayer)
When: Published October 1st 2005
They were the men called upon to do the impossible. A top-secret unit who were tasked with what others would call suicide missions. They were the men who had nothing to lose. Captain Jim Vaughn is a soldier in disgrace. Commanding a special forces mission to capture terrorists in the Philippines, Vaughn's team is destroyed, and when the smoke clears, he is the one made the scapegoat. Forced into the shadows by the scandal, Vaughn is offered a chance to redeem himself when he is approached by an enigmatic government agent looking for a few desperate men.
Vaughn is recruited into a new team, but is shocked to meet his new teammates, a group of men outside of the regular chain of command. These were men who had used up all their second chances. These are men who have crossed the line one too many times. Drug users. Felons. The insane. The terminally ill. These are now the men that Vaughn must trust with his life.
This group of outcasts and misfits has been assembled for two reasons--they are skilled, and they are expendable. These are the kinds of men who are needed to attempt missions the government can't acknowledge, the country can't condone, and the team cannot fail. But the deeper Vaughn gets into the unique group, the more he realizes that the organization may be concealing more than the rap sheets of its most unusual operators. A team of such unique properties is the perfect tool to use againt America's enemies...and possibly America itself.
Another novel from Bob Mayer writing under the pseudonym Robert Doherty. I'd previously read his Area 51 series and enjoyed that immensely, especially his writing style and superb action scenes. Therefore I found that picking this up was a no-brainer.
Here we have a tale of a group of military misfits and screw-ups that are thrown together by a shady organization for covert operations outside the bounds of official knowledge - a group that calls itself Section 8.
The main character is a man by the name of Jim Vaughn who earned his place on the team by being the leader of a botched hostage rescue. After proving his worth as a black ops soldier to the Section 8 people, Vaughn meets the rest of the team who are an equally motley collection with their own personal stories of failure and/or corruption.
They are tasked with the task of dealing with a shady group that has connections to a dark Japanese World War Two secret and a secretive organization that nobody seems to know anything about.
Another cracking yarn that didn't disappoint. Quite a page-turner with nonstop action and just enough depth to the main characters to keep it interesting. The combat scenes are kept brief but are still vivid, the plot is complex enough without being too much and the ending is left open. All in all a good read.
This story is closely followed by The Citadel - which I'm reading now.
10/10
Check it out at Goodreads.
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