Terminal Zone

I liked this novel and kind of educational. The above reviews are better but this is just to point out the stuff one can learn. This is what one should learn: 1) In a gun battle at a hospital never, never, ever under no circumstances hide behind the oxygen tanks. Bullets enter them and boom you are human BBQ. 2) Ladies if you work with the hero and work for the local police in this case Royal Canadian Mounted Police always, always invite him into your apartment at the end of the day. Its called Safe Sex. If not the mob boss will have henchman kidnap you from your apartment. Also if you are the hero make sure with the frag grenades, concussion grenades, guns, clips for the guns you have a condom. In case the lady you are working with invites you into the apartment. 3) Quebec has crime gangs who ever would have thought even the Italian mafia. Wow. 4) When one is a crime boss and you try to sell biological weapons to the North Koreans never, ever have the deal be made in a sealed sub. The hero will just aim a bullet at the container containing the weapon and lock the door sealing you in. A biological weapon is a horrible way to go. This was a very good novel. I always liked the books by Chuck Rogers.

Special Guest Star: Gary Manning Location: Canada, but involves lots of jumping around. Yep, its a Chuck Rogers. Always a single Phoenix Force member holding Bolan's hand and always lots of location shifting with no regard to time and distance. Standard trade marks for Chuck. I did enjoy it and it is up to Chuck Rogers usual standards (although it doesn't reach the dizzying heights of Savage Game). It is cool to see some regualr, standard villains for a change, this time the French Canadian Union Corse, with a bit of the old Italian Mafia thrown in. The plague was well handled and I enjoyed followng Bolan's investigation and adventures throughout Canada, a country that Bolan rarely visits. I liked the good guys, I liked the bad guys, I liked the plot, although it isn't explained why an old Russian scientist would be working for the Union Course, some character development there would have been nice. The only let down was the involvement of the North Koreans at the end, that seemed to be a bit of a cop out and pandering to George Bush's 'Axis of Evil' to get people to buy the book (this was written before NK started to detonate nuclear test weapons. But something was wrong. Something kept this story from being a perfect Bolan adventure. That something was its length. I had the feeling that this was a SuperBolan trying to burst free of its thin Executioner cover. Scenes were often choppy and some chapters just jarred painfully. My case in point would be the jump from chapter nine to ten. The girl gets captured by the bad guys (how original) at the end of chapter nine. Ten starts with Bolan, hours later (because he left her to get some sleep) kicked out of the RCMP (why? no explaination) and is out to find her by attacking the Italian Mafia. He enlists the help of a doctor who is two hours away by air travel. Chapter 11 the has the doctor sitting in the car next to Bolan, after presumably spending at least an hour getting to a plane, flying back to Montreal, and spending another hour teaming up with Bolan and getting out on location. So after all this time has been wasted Bolan eventually rescues the girl, just in the nick of time! This is covered in three very short chapters that left me feeling that somebody either taken a red pen to huge sections of the manuscript or Mr Rogers was in a real rush to get it all finished. Not very satisfying. There were also several editorial errors. To highlight two, on page 110 Mack is refered to as 'the executioner' whilst on page 131 Manning is refered to as 'gummer'. All very strange. The ending on the submarine I found a little disappointing. As pointed out in another review there was no mention made of Big Damage (who never got to duke it out with Mack) and it seemed a little weird that Consolata Malatesta was present. She didn't need to be despite the rubbish explantion that Bolan gives. She could have returned in another story, Chuck! This was a wasted character!! So it was good, and I enjoyed it, it was just marred by some silly mistakes and not enough forethough on the authors part.

Yet another excellent read from Mr. Rogers which keeps you turning the pages. The Mafia are the villians thank god there are still some of them around to write into books. I thought the plot was excellent and the descriptions of what the poor buggers who have contracted the virus have happen to their bodies is chilling stuff. Action scenes are plentiful and again very well done some of the descriptions beautiful. The little quips and humour was very good reading example: "The lawn looked like it had been savaged by an army of gophers on crack". classic. The final scenes in the sub are rivetting stuff. This is a highly recommended read in the series. BUT why only 7 stars ?? 2 stars deducted....... We have in the book YET BLOODY AGAIN Macks' sidekick female partner who of course is drop dead gorgeous and who of course has a large set of breasts who OF COURSE gets kidnapped by the bad guys which of course eats up a chapter or two while Mack rattles the cages to find the location where the said female is being held and promptly arrives in the nick of time to rescue her. Chuck WHAT THE BLOODY HELL WERE YOU THINKING ??? Mike Newton alone has done this so many times it is almost a prerequisit when reading one of his books it has also been done by numerous authors in the series. I for one and I bet there are many other long time readers of these series who shudder when you have to read it again.

Special Guest Star: Gary Manning Bolan is dispatched to Canada where a flesh-eating bacteria had surfaced. He quickly uncovers a mob connection to a larger, terrorist scenario. Chuck Rogers, who wrote this, weaves an excellent story with his signature, sharp, punchy writing style. Wit is abundant. So is an uncommon (to the series) dose of sex and humor. In “Terminal Zone,” Bolan faces a very credible threat, not the usual bus-load of inferiors. Carlo is his peer in this one. Their confrontation at the lodge is the highlight. Just reading the lodge chapter is worth the price of this book. There is a wealth of humor and lethal surprises, as Bolan convincingly almost buys it. Twice. He also has a memorable run in with a porn star (not really what you might think). I really can’t think of any negatives. Perhaps the usual fuzziness from Rogers’ novels of how much time actually elapses from scene to scene. This is really enjoyable. Bolan faces more twists, turns and surprises than an average entry. It also has a fantastic finale.

Liked the idea behind this plot, I just didn't care for the mob as being the instigators behind the flesh-eating virus. Some good action scenes were thrown in, along with Gary Manning joining Bolan in his Canadian campaign. Loved the pro wrestler character, but thought the ending aboard the sub was not on the grand scale that some of Chuck's other books were.

Great entry to series. I have allways liked Mob as villains and french mob is even better. Action scenes was spot on perfect. Great villains and great plot. Bolan took quite bit punishment (again) in this entry. May be I miss read something but I was left unsure what happened to Big Damage. I know that he should have died in the sub but that was not confirmed in the end. So...

This was basically the Executioner as done by Eli Roth. I liked the description of the first victim and the gory details, but the plot was a little dull for my taste.

What a great entry into the series by Chuck Rogers...as usual. And as usual Rogers threw in everything but the kitchen sink. It was great to see Bolan unleashed in Canada, the plot was riveting & somewhat original and the action & storytelling was intense. Bolan's RCMP sidekick was another great charcter added to the story. It was nice seeing a contemporary update to the age-old nemesis of the mafia. The finale aboard the submarine has you unable to put the book down until to you read how it ends. As usual I'm always looking forward until Chuck Rogers' next Bolan book.