Stony Man · #73

Cold Objective

by Dan Schmidt · October 2004

6.0 / 10 average from 3 rated reviews

The most sophisticated covert agency in the world, Stony Man stands on the front lines of America's defense. Cybernetics wizards are the brains behind the muscle of the elite in-field commando forces of Able Team and Phoenix Force. Now, Stony Man stares down a blood horizon, racing to head off the mother of all catastrophic incidents, the destruction of the Alaskan oil pipeline. Blinding Fire. A Seattle-based oil tycoon has put his wealth and twisted vision to work in a quest to control the world's oil reserves. He's got what it takes to pull it off: the Russian mafiya on his payroll, and Middle East sympathizers willing to die to see America burn. And if that's not enough, he's got the nukes and bioweapons to bring the world to its knees. Stony Man unleashes an all-out assault, knowing that a few good men are all it takes to stand up, be counted and face down evil. Or die trying.

Reviews (3)

D-sol 7/10 January 20, 2009

This one was all right. All the action sequences are described really nicely. I loved how Carl Lyons was his usual angry self and how Able Team broke every law to catch the bad guys. THis is the oldest Stony I have read, so it is the only one I read with Mack Bolan in it. His arc of the story was also very well done. Pheonix Forces part in the story seemed kind of weak. But the scene where Bolan and Pheonix Force cleans house after the air strike was very well done. I almost forgot Able Team was in the novel because it was all about them in the beginning of the book, then you don't hear about them again till the end. But, it was still a enjoyable book.

ice_cracked 4/10 January 18, 2009

No sorry not for me, this one is just crap. After a semi interesting starting couple of chapters the title switches to the big guy who is teamed up with a gung ho CIA Colonel Alpha and his black ops team and they proceed to smash/bomb/slaughter "THOUSANDS" of terrorists. One section features a terrorist base of four thousand members which is bombed non stop by who knows how many bombers for a one hour period before Mack tags along with the Colonel and Phoenix Force to enter the carnage from the other side of the previous base for a mopup. Mopup up what? But apparently there are still a few who were hiding in caves and tunnels so terrific we can read even more carnage and slaughter and paint the tunnel walls red with blood and body parts with all the wonderful descriptions by the author as body parts are blown away from bodies, heads exploding, bodies being blown to pieces, chuck in some flamethrower guys and yeah we can even cook some of them etc. etc. etc. BORING BORING BORING Oh hang on we are almost finished the title after filling up over 3/4 of it with the above repetitive garbage and we have to finish off the starting couple of chapters. The main villian is a two time ex world karate champion billionaire who has come up with one of the poorest plots for world domination I have read and fair dinkum if you couldn't see an unarmed contest between him and Lyons coming up you were asleep while reading this. And it is all over folks and I thought to myself just a little bit of a plot and storyline would be so good. The endless slaughter here over and over and over again for me is just boring reading. Better than this is the series.

Gunslinger 7/10 January 15, 2005

Sort of a return for me to Schmidt's greatness in the mid-80's with this slam-bang entry. Able Team is as much like the Able Team of the 80's with Lyons at his grumpiest and their break 20 laws, insult every Fed and who gives a fu** attitude. Their arc of the story was by far the best, especially the Bulldozer carnage. Lyons barging into the bad guys' lair and reading them the riot was classic. The Phoenix arc seemed weak, but the action was still top notch with some pulse-pounding air strikes. Overall, a nice surprise.