Blue Warrior by Mike Maden
My rating: 1 of 5 stars
The term purple prose was invented for books like this. Here are a couple of sentences from Chapter 21: “Distant jet engines split the air like rolling thunder, and black smoke smudged the crystalline blue sky.” “…the Pakistani’s throat blossomed in petals of blood and meat.” The plot, if there is one, seems to be nothing more than a loose thread intended to string together violent action scenes designed mainly to display the author’s knowledge of aircraft, weapons, and military stuff in general. The writing and editing are sloppy. He introduces a character called Zhou Yi, then a few paragraphs later he is called Zhao Yi, then back to Zhou briefly, then finally he settles on the name Zhao. Apparently Putnam doesn’t employ competent editors any longer. This book was a disappointment because I owned a “drone,” i.e. personal multirotor aircraft, and thought the premise sounded good, but there’s a limit to what I can stomach. If you’re into drones, try Sting of the Drone: A Novel or Death Row. Both are much better.