Category: Review

Ride or Die

  By

★½
“Die, please.”

This is not to be confused with the rather higher profile i.e. it’s available on Netflix, Japanese film with the same title, made the same year, and covering a not dissimilar theme. Both are about a woman who is prepared to commit murder, in order to save their best friend from an abusive relationship. However, after the killing in question, the films take divergent paths. The Japflix version becomes a road-trip movie, with the killer and her friend going on the run. This, however, focuses heavily on the killer, whose already fragile mental state falls apart completely, after she discovers that things weren’t quite as she had been led to believe. It’s not her first time at the homicide rodeo either.

For that to work, it needs to have a convincing relationship at its core, and this fails miserably on that level. Ashley (Allen) may be willing to do anything for Mandy (Brooks), but we are never shown why this might be the case: just told it, and expected to accept this at face-value. It’s less credible than the BFFs in Jennifer’s Body, and that is a low bar indeed. It doesn’t help that Brooks is, to put it bluntly, one of the worst actresses I’ve seen given a major role in a movie for a very long time. Yet she’s not ever the worst in this movie: that goes to the “grandmother” who recites her lines from off-screen. My granny would have delivered them with greater conviction, and she has been dead for approaching forty years.

Allen is, at least relatively, watchable, with a smokey voice which makes her resemble a young version of Yancy Butler. The film did manage to hold my attention for about 20 minutes. This began with Ash shooting the abusive boyfriend (Rehman) in the face, and having to deal with an unexpected witness (Blundon), and runs through the revelation that upends Ashley’s worldview. However, the movie singularly fails to do anything significant with it, and all the hallucinatory nonsense thereafter, with Ash being visited by her victims, was completely unable to re-ignite my interest. There is zero development, and too many strands are painstakingly set up, only to go nowhere, e.g. the nosy waitress, another performance which it would be kind to call thoroughly wretched.

The complete lack of any official interest in the killing spree is understandable, the budget clearly not stretching to any forces in authority. Yet this does not excuse the second half degenerating into dull scenes of Ashley driving around, mindless chit-chat or PG-rated lesbian canoodling with more people who can’t emote their way out of a moist paper-bag. In (marginal) defense, they are not helped by a number of scenes apparently being re-dubbed in post, or a musical score that doesn’t so much complement the on-screen action, as compete vigorously with it for attention. It’s a race to the bottom there, and neither aspect gets out of here alive.

Dir: Aly Hardt
Star: Vanessa Allen, Hannah Brooks, Celeste Blandon, Raavian Rehman

Voevoda

  By

★★½
“Never mind the Bulgars”

Well, at the very least, we get to cross another country off the map, in the Action Heroine Atlas. This comes from Bulgaria, and seems to have been a labour of love for Sophia, who co-wrote, directed, produced and starred in it (her daughter plays the younger version of the lead). You don’t see that often, especially in our chosen field. Yet I suspect it could end up having caused more problems than it solves. I’ve often found that films where one person wears so many hats, end up being too “close” to be entirely successful. By which I mean, the maker is so involved they can’t see the flaws, when another pair of eyes might have been able to identify and correct these issues.

I believe this is based on a historical figure. Though I say this based almost entirely on an IMDb review which says, “Rumena was a real person and we know what happened to her.” Well, perhaps Bulgarians do. I have no clue, and was unable to find much out on the Internet: even the film’s website was vague on details. I am also largely ignorant – and, I freely admit, this is a me problem – about Bulgarian history. It seems that at the time this was set in the 19th century, the country was occupied by the Ottoman Empire. That’s about all I’ve got, and can’t say I learned much more from the movie.

The heroine is Roumena (Sophia), who is targeted by the Ottoman occupiers, and subsequently heads off into the mountains and woods, to become the titular leader of a group of bandits and rebels. From there, she wages a guerilla war on the Ottomans. For instance, after they kidnap a young village woman, she and the rest of her cheta kidnap the two sons of the commanding officer, in order to exchange them. This insurgency eventually leads to the Ottomans sending a whole mass of troops after her. Yet Roumena’s example has also helped foster a desire for independence in the locals – albeit at the cost of effectively having to abandon her young son, so that he can have a safe, and somewhat normal childhood.

It’s all quite impenetrable, with limited dialogue and largely non-professional actors. While this likely does enhance the realism, it feels like it comes at the cost of genuine drama. The saving grace is Sophia, who cuts a interesting figure as Roumena: all fierce and unwilling to compromise in any aspect of her life. She wins leadership of the cheta by, literally, wrestling for the position, and takes no shit from anyone. Yet at 126 minutes long, it feels too much of a slog through the wilderness, with a permanently surly supporting cast who are largely distinguishable from each other, only by their facial hair. If you can imagine a dour version of the Robin Hood legend, in which Robin gets betrayed by his merry men, then you’ll be along the right lines.

Dir: Zornitsa Sophia
Star: Zornitsa Sophia, Valeri Yordanov, Goran Gunchev, Dimitar Trokanov

The Swordswoman, by Malcolm Archibald

  By

Literary rating: ★★★★
Kick-butt quotient: ☆☆☆☆

I am, probably, biased here. Scottish action heroines are pretty rare, to the point I am hard pushed to think of a single one I’ve covered previously, in the twenty years I’ve been running this domain. [I just made myself feel very old…] So I was likely disposed to feel kindly towards this literary example. But even setting aside patriotic tendencies, I genuinely enjoyed reading this. It takes place, I’m guessing, around the 9th century, when Scotland was still a loosely connected set of tribes, albeit with a king in what’s now Edinburgh, and a rather fragile peace with the Norse neighbours.

That peace is shattered when someone is washed up on the Western Isles island of Dachaigh where 20-year-old Melcorka lives with her mother. It turns out the Norse are invading, and the king must be notified of the threat. Melcorka and the rest of her clan head towards the capital, only to arrive too late: the army of Alba (as Scotland was then called) has been routed and the nobles scattered. However, Melcorka has a destiny to fulfill… And also inherits a large sword, Defender, with a history dating back centuries, whose powers transform her into the titular character. It’s up to her to rally forces, including the ferocious Picts from the North, to take on the invaders, and send them back across the North Sea to Scandinavia.

It’s not quite historical, not quite fantasy: or, rather, this has elements of both. Events occur in real places: fun fact, up until he retired, my father worked in Burghead, the modern site of Pictish capital Am Broch in the book – I grew up less than 20 miles away. I kept found myself going to Wikipedia to look up particular locations, as Melcorka and her allies moved through the country. But there are some elements which are mystical, such Melcorka venturing into Elfhame, the realm of Faery. At least in this volume, those are limited, and the rest feels grounded. Very grounded in some areas, particularly the battle descriptions, which don’t pull punches: “the slide of intestines as blades ripped open bellies and the pink-grey splurge of brains as swords split skulls.”

It’s certainly not all gore though, and Melcorka realizes there’s a gulf between battle as described in the sagas and heroic songs, and the real thing. It’s part of her development as a heroine, which may be this book’s strongest suit. She starts as an innocent, almost naive young woman, takes her lumps and comes out the other side, wiser if not necessarily happier for it. Credit is also due to Archibald for telling a complete, satisfying story without the need for a gratuitous cliff-hanger. That helps leave me much more likely to invest further in the series, as time permits. He has done the country proud, and I look forward to discovering where Melcorka’s destiny will take her.

Author: Malcolm Archibald
Publisher: Next Chapter, available through Amazon, both as a paperback and an e-book
Book 1 of 5 in The Swordswoman series.

An Eye for an Eye (2000)

  By

★★
“Somewhat eye-dentical.”

This opens with a scene that is almost a direct life from the similarly titled Eye for An Eye, directed by John Schlesinger four years previously. Here, businesswoman Carmen Pak (Cheong) is on a video-call – or, at least, the primitive 2000 version thereof – with her daughter, Shan (Tong), when someone breaks in and attacks Shan. Carmen can do little except watch in horror as her daughter is brutalized and raped. Though Shan identifies her rapist as Kiu Chi Yeung (Tong), there’s enough doubt over her statement, specifically regarding a tattoo he does not posses, that the police are unable to do anything. After further tragedy, Carmen decides to seek the justice she has been denied, through her own hands.

To this movie’s mild credit, it does divert from its American predecessor after the opening sequence, though this never manages to find its own identity entirely. It’s based on a rather shaky premise: namely that someone accused of rape would then, almost without hesitation, embark on a relationship with his accuser’s mother. It’s not even as if Yeung doesn’t know who Carmen is, which could have given the concept a sheen of plausibility. She’s right there when Shan physically attacks him after they both leave the police station. The script tries to walk a line of uncertainty as to whether or not Shan is guilty, though not particularly successfully. If you can’t figure out who was the perpetrator before the final confrontation, you haven’t been paying enough attention.

I did like the supporting character of Officer Chan (Ko), who initially comes off as a bit of a callous jerk, caring more about his mahjong losses than the rape case he’s investigating. However, he becomes more sympathetic as things unfold, being more a harried and overworked cop, who still tries to warn Carmen into taking care of things herself. It’s likely a better arc than the heroine gets, her development being largely summarized in a training montage where she hides a knife in the sofa, and uses it to attack innocent watermelons. It’s a curiously specific bit of practice, one made all the more odd by having little or no relevance down the road. She’s no more than semi-competent in terms of self-defense.

The same grade likely applies to the film-making on view as a whole. I can’t point to any elements that are especially deficient. Yet even less can I point to any elements which demonstrate innovation or even artistry. Everything plods along in workmanlike fashion, towards an ending that offers no particular surprises or thrills. Considering the subject matter, it’s surprisingly tame as exploitation, and would barely seem out of place as a Lifetime original movie. I was left yearning for the lurid excess of someone like Wong Jing to inject some pep into proceedings. We are, after all, talking about an anti-rapist vigilante here. This feels more like Carmen is fighting white-collar crime of some kind.

Dir: Yuen Shu-Wai
Star: Angie Cheong,  Michael Tong, Blacky Ko, Leila Tong

Where We Disappear

  By

★★★
“A chilly tale of isolation”

It’s the end of World War II in Russia, and Anastasia (Haig) is at the station to welcome her husband home from the front. Except, realizing he is still the same abusive jerk he was, she stabs him dead. This gets her an extended stay in a Siberian gulag, as a guest of HM Stalin’s government, a situation for which she is entirely unsuited. As soon as she arrives in the remote prison, the first cabin-mate she meets comments on the softness of her hands, and she’s told she won’t survive a week. The biggest threat, however, may not be the Arctic conditions, but the other inmates. In particular, Masha (Andersen), who has taken over as leader after previous top dog, Lubov (Isabelle), suffered an “accident”. The question is, what is Anastasia prepared to do, and how far will she go, in order to survive?

Although this lasts only 73 minutes, end-to-end, it feels longer. That isn’t particularly a bad thing, since it’s mostly a reflection of the near-constant tension. There’s a perpetual sense of menace here, with violence and abuse – physical, mental or spiritual – always lurking just beneath the surface, whether from guards or other prisoners. That tends to make for a stressful experience for the viewer, as they can never relax. The pace is relentless. Things unfold not quite in real time after Anastasia’s arrival, but it does take place over her first night there. Another prisoner escapes, and the women have to decide how to handle that, especially with Lubov, who has a “cozy” relationship with one of the guards, now indisposed. Fresh meat Anastasia and her soft hands is the obvious replacement; not a task she’s willing to take on. Eventually, she’s coerced into the task, which doesn’t unfold as anyone expects.

This was based on Arthur M. Jolly’s stage play, A Gulag Mouse, and its origins in the theatre are frequently clear, both in the limited locations and importance placed on  dialogue. It might have been nice had Fink taken greater advantage of the freedoms afforded by cinema, but I imagine the claustrophobic atmosphere generated is entirely intentional. I must confess to being rather confused by the final act, which seems to throw the hard realism in which the rest of the picture is grounded, completely out of the window. By the end, I was far from clear how much of what I’d witnessed previously, had taken place in any subjective reality. It could be virtually any number from zero to a hundred percent, and I found its unwillingness to commit somewhat aggravating.

However, the performances are well-executed, each drawing the different aspects of their characters well. Andersen perhaps stands out, as a woman whose presence in the gulag is due to something far darker than the “stealing an apple” to which she blithely confesses. There’s enough potential generated in the first hour for a 13-episode series, and it’s a bit of a shame that the ending proves incapable of doing it justice.

Dir: Simon Fink
Star: Georgina Haig, Jolene Andersen, Katharine Isabelle, Vera Cherny

The Huntress of Auschwitz

  By

★★
“About three decades too late.”

I came into this somewhat braced, given its 3.0 IMDb rating, and reviews which tended to be scathing e.g. proclaiming “This May Be The WORST Movie I’ve Ever Seen!” While it’s clearly not great, this is not eye-wateringly terrible. The good news is, it’s probably one performance away from approaching decent. The bad news is, it’s the lead role which is the biggest problem. This belongs to the unnamed Huntress (Watts-Joyce), a supposed American who travels to England, to go after a Nazi war criminal,  Rudolf Tannhäuser (Richards), and deliver the justice he has escaped since World War II. Tannhauser is now living quietly under an assumed identity n a farm in the English countryside.

There’s your first problem. This is clearly contemporary i.e. up-to-date iPhones, meaning Tannhauser would now need to be well into his nineties, even if he had been a 16-year-old when the war ended. He’s painted as considerably more senior, and there’s no conceivable way that Richards is pushing a century. Another issue: there really is precious little hunting, and nothing like the cover. She simply shows up on his doorstep, faking a turned ankle, and drugs him. Then we get a great deal of chit-chat as she tries to convince him to come clean about his past, and he repeatedly says she has the wrong guy. If Watts-Joyce did not have the emotional range of a fence-post, these conversations might have generated some tension.

They stand in sharp contrast to the delivery by veteran actress Lenska, playing concentration-camp survivor Amelia Kaminska. [Lenska was born in 1947, so is at least plausible as a child of Auschwitz] Her simple retelling of the horrors which she witnessed and went through are, far and away, the best part of the movie, and proof of how it’s not necessary to show things, when the delivery of the description is good enough. The film would have been far better a) set in the nineties, and b) with Amelia being the person to go after Tannhauser. The fact he killed one of the Huntress’s great-grandparents feels too distant and impersonal – again, compounded by the lead actress’s inability to sell the necessary emotions.

The pacing has some problems too: particularly in the beginning, there are too many scenes which end up being totally irrelevant. Her meeting with some kind of handler, or the travel montage, culminating in the Huntress standing around for what feels like forever, chatting to a pal on the phone. Once we reach the meat of the matter, with Tannhauser tied up, things improve a bit. The problem is, we’re already over half an hour in, and the film has really offered very little reason to engage with it. Thereafter, you’re waiting for the revenge that you know is inevitably going to come (though I wonder: how easy is it to gas someone to death in the middle of an open field?). It probably needs to be either exploitative or thoughtful: it’s neither, and consequently is unlikely to satisfy anyone.

Dir: Richard John Taylor
Star: Lowri Watts-Joyce, Jeffrey Charles Richards, Rula Lenska, Paul Dewdney

Ballistic

  By

★★
“Can’t spell Ballistic without balls…”

You know you’re in for a slice of stinky, nineties action cheese from the opening sequence. Undercover cop Jesse (Holden) has just taken down a sleazy yuppie drug-dealer, and a homeless woman tells her, “You know what you are, sweetie? You’re ballistic!” We probably need to explain why the film is titled that way, because there’s really not an enormous amount of great action here to justify it. Jesse is your typical, no-nonsense cop, who has just transferred from homicide to the Urban Crime Taskforce, where she is meeting resistance from her new colleagues. She is also trying to help her father (Roundtree), a former cop now doing 20 years after being framed with kilos of coke.

Jesse inevitably makes enemies: she comes under suspicious when a witness is killed on her watch, and is then suspected of the murder of the other cop who was in the safe-house. In reality, it’s all a plot by “respectable businessman” Braden (Jones), who inevitably is a dealer in both drugs and illegal weapons. He runs illegal fights in a warehouse lined with cardboard boxes: his top henchman, the person who killed the cop, is actually a woman, Claudia (the impressive looking body-builder Corinna Everson), and we get a small role from Michael Jai White, who would go on to considerably better things than this. As would the movie’s composer, Tyler Bates, and the cast also includes veteran cult actor Charles Napier as Jesse’s superior.

Despite a relatively good cast, it’s largely dull, often almost painfully so, with the action scenes suffering from a particularly brutal style of editing. Holden comes at at six foot even in height, towering over some of her male co-stars even when not wearing high heels, and does have a degree of film presence. It’s just that Bass, making his directorial debut, does not appear to have any idea of how she should be used. Early on, she’s treated as not much more than a slice of cheesecake, e.g. the opening credits feature Jesse showering in slo-mo, for no reason beyond titillation. The sex scenes with her boyfriend (a character which serves no purpose) are little better, and you could make the case Claudia is actually treated more seriously than the heroine.

The film does at least have the courtesy to give us a fight between the two women, though like much of the rest, the results are far from overwhelming, with them lazily snapping kicks toward each other, at a glacial pace. That’s about the peak as far as Jesse is concerned, with the movie’s climax thereafter largely involving a lot of running round the warehouse by everyone involved. It’s difficult to believe this kind of feature would ever have passed muster, even in the days of straight to video schlock. Though given this was the effective end of Holden’s career as a leading lady, perhaps it didn’t.

Dir:  Kim Bass
Star: Marjean Holden, Sam J. Jones, James Lew, Richard Roundtree
a.k.a. Fist of Justice

Catch the Fair One

  By

★★★
“Down for the count.”

Quite often, in films featuring women who are supposed to be boxers, they simply do not look the part. Safe to say, this is not an issue here. That is apparent from the opening scene, in which Kaylee (Reis) is preparing for a fight. As she warms up with her trainer, the speed and power of her punches is clear, and not cinematic trickery. It’s unsurprising, since Reis is, at time of writing. the current WBA, WBO and IBO light-welterweight world champion. It’s just a shame this movie chooses not to make more use of her undoubted talents in the combat field, and is a tad too earnest to be value as entertainment.

Kaylee falls into a downward spiral after her sister Weeta (Borrero) vanishes, and is barely scraping by, but then receives information that Weeta was abducted by a sex trafficking ring. With the authorities unwilling to do anything – the number of indigenous women who suffer this fate, or are flat-out murdered is startling – it’s up to Kaylee. She infiltrates the ring run by Bobby (Henshall), only to find it’s a lot harder to get out than in, and that he isn’t necessarily the man in charge. If I may trot out a tired boxing cliche, she’s in for the fight of her life, as she seeks the truth about what happened to her sister, and whether Weeta is alive or dead.

Reis is the best thing this has going for it, and the makers know it. There’s a raw intensity which is utterly convincing, as she throws herself into a terrible situation in pursuit of Weeta. Though you do have to wonder why she apparently waited so long before trying to track down her supposedly beloved sibling, leaving the trail close to stone-cold. I mentioned “value as entertainment” above, and that should probably be stressed. This isn’t a Taken-style popcorn audience pleaser. It’s more of a descent into hell, which will leave neither Kaylee nor those with whom she crosses paths unscathed, to put it mildly. The heroine was already badly damaged going in: she sleeps with a razor-blade tucked in her mouth for defense purposes, a note that goes nowhere except as a character trait.

Much the same is true of her boxing talents, which never particularly come to the forefront, leaving me wondering why they made them part of the film. I did have to admire its relentlessly grim tone: there’s hardly a moment of light here, until the very end of the movie. Even then, the carpet of comfort is brutally yanked out from underneath the feet of the viewer with the final shot before the credits roll. I’m not sure if Reis has any future as an actress – or even whether she has an interest in such. However, if this proves to be the beginning and end of her career on-screen, it will still be better than many more accomplished actresses manage.

Dir: Josef Kubota Wladyka
Star: Kali Reis, Daniel Henshall, Kevin Dunn, Mainaku Borrero

Steele Wool

  By

★★★
“Puts the ‘hard’ in hard of hearing…”

Daphne Wool (Varela) has finally had enough of her abusive husband, so has killed him, chopping up the corpse and keeping it in a storage locker. Which actually is a good thing, because it turns out he was wanted by the Mob, and there was a price on his head. For their “help” in carrying out the hit, Daphne and pal Tony Steele (Cappello) are rewarded, but things go further. Daphne becomes a full-time assassin for the gangsters, learning to kill with everything from a paper-clip up, while Tony acts as her facilitator. However, they quickly become a liability to the organization, and are given a “poison pill” contract, being sent to kill weapons inventor Vincent McCabe.

The approach here is very much light in intent. Witness how Daphne’s training is largely watching movies like La Fille Nadia [sic], or the way in which she does, in fact, use a paper-clip as the instrument of one target’s demise. The film does a decent job of countering this with an awareness that this is a dirty and unpleasant business, as when she visits (from a distance) the widow of a target and their now fatherless child. It is a difficult balance for a movie to strike, and I’m not convinced Cappello gets it right, resulting in some awkward lurches in tome from the comedic to the supposedly heart-felt. Both come off a bit flat: I never got past a wry smile, and was never completely engaged.

This is not Varela’s fault, nor that of her character. Daphne is played gloriously against all the tropes of the female assassin: it’s no coincidence her most effective undercover disguise is an estate agent. Add to this, Varela is deaf: this element affects, yet does not define, her character and that’s exactly the way disability should be portrayed. It is even worked nicely in to the plot, with one of McCabe’s weapons in development being a sonic cannon. However, I’d like to have seen more of her in action; perhaps for budgetary reasons, this is limited, or perhaps Cappello just wasn’t interested in that aspect.

This brings me to the other issue: Cappello the director is too much in love with Cappello the actor. The latter wears out his welcome well before riding to the rescue of the supposed heroine, in McCabe’s underground lair. This is a shame, since Daphne is such a gloriously unconventional character, the reverse should have happened. Tony is never interesting to begin with, the script (also by Cappello, naturally) forgetting to give him any particular reason to exist, beyond Daphne needing someone to talk to. Having him become the hero for the finale, feels forced and unnatural. This is not enough to derail an excellent concept, or negate what I think is likely only the second disabled action heroine on this site, after Ready, Willing and Able. Yet it’s definitely a pity.

Dir: Frank A. Cappello
Star: Cami Varela, Frank A. Cappello, Nicholas Ontiveros, Arina Manta

Tracie Tanner Thrillers, Vol 1-3 by Allan Leverone

  By

Parallax View
Literary rating: ★★★
Kick-butt quotient: ☆☆☆½

This largely unfolds over the period of about a week in May-June 1987. History buffs will recall that being the time when the Soviet Union was beginning to fall apart, and it’s that which provides the background to the novel. President of the USSR, Mikhail Gorbachev is trying to shepherd his country into a more open era, but is facing strong opposition from some elements within the government. He writes a letter to his American counterpart, Ronald Reagan, whose contents are potentially explosive, and which the anti-Gorbachev faction in the Kremlin will do anything to stop. They fail to stop the communication being handed to American courier and CIA agent Tracie Tanner in East Berlin, but that’s only the start of their efforts to prevent Tracie completing her mission.

This is the kind of book I liked despite its flaws – and there are quite a few of those. The plot really wouldn’t stand up to scrutiny: it’s the old “She can’t trust anyone” trope, and it’d take about five minutes of thought by a trained intelligence operative to figure out how she could bypass that. Meanwhile, Tracie has no qualms putting her complete faith in the male lead, hunky (but thoroughly doomed – he just found out he has an inoperable brain tumour) air-traffic controller Shane Rowley. No surprises for guessing where those two end up. Despite the period setting, there’s not much sense of that very specific era, and Leverone does spend too much time diverting into background information on characters who, in truth, are not more than fringe players. Finally, while it’s clear who the “bad guys” are, it might have helped if there had been a particular antagonist, rather than a series of relatively faceless Russian agents and American traitors.

However, you shouldn’t necessarily let any of the above dissuade you, since they are largely the kind of criticisms I only realized after I’d finished the book, and was contemplating this review. The author does a fine job of managing the pace, keeping things moving at a fast and furious rate. There’s one hurdle after another for Tracie and Shane to overcome, as they hurtle towards the final confrontation, atop a building in Washington. There are even occasional moments where I was genuinely impressed by Tracie’s smarts, such as her taking two motel rooms on opposite sides. Leverone has a very good eye for action, and some of the set pieces are positively cinematic, such as the fight on board a B-52, and its subsequent marginally controlled descent. Could quibble about the way Tracie needs “rescued” at the end, except it’s foreshadowed well enough to make sense.

All Enemies
Literary rating: ★★★½
Kick-butt quotient: ☆☆☆

After finishing Volume 1, I was pleased to discover I’d been smart enough to pick up Volumes 1-3 as a freebie (you can also get the first seven books for ten bucks). Having been solidly entertained by the first book, I headed more or less straight in to the next two, figuring that it would be a good candidate for our first ever featured book review. I wasn’t disappointed. This is another slick page-turner, albeit one with some of the same issues as its predecessor.

It begins only a couple of days after the events which ended the first volume. Traci is already back out in the field, even though she is still healing – both physically and mentally – from the damage she suffered while completing her mission.Only the personal intervention of President Reagan saved her from being drummed out of the CIA by Director Aaron Stallings, but it’s clear she is not exactly his flavour of the month.

A couple of months later, in September 1987, things kick off properly with the abduction of US Secretary of State J. Robert Humphries from his home in Georgetown. He’s a close personal friend of the President, who orders Stallings carry out an off-the-books operation, using a lone operative, to find out what happened and who’s responsible. No prizes for guessing to whom the director gives this fraught mission The initial evidence all seems to point to it being a Russian plot, this being the peak of the Cold War, but the more Tracie looks into the matter, the more it seems the Russians are being set up to take the fall, and the real culprits are elsewhere. Trying to tell Stallings this only gets her fired from the CIA; naturally, this is barely an inconvenience for the heroine.

As in the first book, the circumstances do throw Tracie back onto relying almost exclusively on her own talents. While she does get some help from CIA Analyst Marshall Fulton, it’s mostly information, which helps her put the pieces together. He’s a desk jockey, and although brave enough, ends up literally dropped off by the side of the road, as Tracie speeds off on her rescue mission. There is a slight sense of romantic tension between them; it doesn’t amount to much, yet still feels a bit awkward, considering how close we are to the personal tragedy Tracie endured in book #1. Her stoic refusal to call for back-up also felt a little strained. I get she no longer had official standing, yet there’s a point where this seemed a tad contrived.

It is a bit more of a stealth mission, which is what leads to the slightly lower kick-butt quotient for this: there’s more creeping around, trying not to be detected, in place of plane crashes, gun battles and chases. However, it feels more coherent and has a better ring of plausibility to it. Each piece of the story connects well to the next, and does a good job of drawing the reader along, towards the eventual climax on an small island off the East coast. My reading is usually split, with one book on my phone and a different one on the tablet. So it likely says something that, as soon as I finished this, I loaded up volume three on both my devices, the better to get into it.

The Omega Connection
Literary rating: ★★★
Kick-butt quotient: ☆☆☆☆

Again, there’s no much of a pause between the end of one story and the beginning of the next. No matter how much Tracie may have been taxed by her exploits, she’s thrown back out there by boss Stallings, on another hazardous mission. I do wonder about her motivation, since she’s now entirely off-books, no longer even being a CIA employee: why love your country so much, and be prepared to put your life on the line for it, when its agencies treat you in such a disrespectful manner? I’d be high-tailing it towards the private security sector after all she’s gone through. That might just be me though.

This begins with an electronics company being decimated by a bomb attack, with its CEO also murdered in his hotel room. Threatening letters had been received, blaming the corporation for its role in the Bay of Pigs fiasco over a quarter of a century previously, an abortive invasion attempt against Fidel Castro’s Cuba, which cost the lives of many Cuban expats. Now, it appears, someone is out for payback. Tracey is assigned, first to bring in the only surviving member of the board, its R&D genius, Edison Kiley, then find out the person or persons responsible and make them stop. The task will take her into the darker corners of the expat community in Miami, over into Cuba itself, before she has to go deep into the almost unexplored territory of the Florida Everglades.

There is a certain sense of deja vu, in that as in All Enemies, the culprit for whom Tracie is seeking, is not who it initially appears. Neither book makes much effort to hide this fact: they’re not really whodunnits. However, it is a little too familiar for my tastes, and she also accepts what she is told regarding this by a certain party as the truth. While she is limited in what she can do, due to her unofficial status, I’d still expect her to be a little more “Trust, but verify…”

The best thing here is likely the main antagonist. They spend most of the film in the background, with Tracie dealing mostly with the results of their action. However, the eventual face-off is worth the wait, a downright brutal and savage brawl in the depths of the Florida swamps. It’s good enough to make me wish they’d met up earlier in the story, and had more than one such encounter. By the end, I’d be hard-pushed to say Tracie had shown much character development. She’s more or less in the same place she was at the start of volume 3 – just with a bullet wound in her leg, and a nasty concussion. However, the whole trilogy proved to be more than an adequately fun read, and I would not bet against further volumes showing up here, down the road.

Author: Allan Leverone
Publisher: Rock Bottom Books, available through Amazon, both as a paperback and an e-book
Books 1-3 of 9 in the Tracie Tanner Thrillers series.