Contagion Option

Contagion Option is an excellent read from Douglas P Wojtowicz. If you’ve ever read any of DPWs works before, this shouldn’t be that shocking. I first read his SuperBolan “Devil’s Playground” a couple years ago when I first got back into Bolanverse books; ever since then I’ve been hooked and I make sure I read ALL of his books. Recently I acquired a large stock of older DPW books and I have been going back and reading them. Although I still love his work, I’m not as enamored with his books as I once was. The action is always great or exceptional, but at times I feel like his work can get a little repetitive. That’s one of the reasons I love Contagion Option so much. This book is fresh and original (at least to me). Bolan starts off attacking a ship that is transporting strange cargo to North Korea. This opening scene is really well done, with lots of interesting bad guys and great action from Mack. And best of all it gives Mack the chance to blitz North Korea. I’ve read a lot of Bolanverse books, and this is the first one to feature significant action in North Korea. Perhaps there was a time when many of the books took place in North Korea, and I just haven’t read them yet, but I must say I loved seeing the Executioner ply his trade north of the 38th parallel. It turns out that the North Koreans are only unwitting pawns in the villain’s game, which results in Bolan getting some America time too. Apparently from the other reviews from this book, the villain is the lone survivor of the actions in “Extreme Arsenal”, although I have to admit I had literally JUST finished reading that book before choosing this one, and I don’t remember him. It’s probably just my poor recall skills though. Another major component to this book is the second team of do-gooders, Reader & Graham. These are two great characters with interesting back stories and intriguing adventures of their own, so there sections of the book are very interesting. Although I preferred the Bolan sections, the Reader & Graham parts were excellent as well. Aside from the fresh location & great characters, I found the MacGuffin of the story to be very intriguing; again, much different from the run of the mill nuke, terrorist, or even bio-threat. Although it is biological in nature, the weapon’s method of action and manufacture are chilling to say the least. If you have the opportunity to read this book, I strongly recommend it. A great read from cover to cover.

This is a very good read indeed so settle in for a big title where there is no filling meaning a non-stop action packed read from start to finish. I really like original stuff when reading one of these titles and so is this one add in some of the more memorable characters introduced and some brilliant action scenes featuring some in close hand to hand stuff a fine read indeed. Highly recommended reading folks.

The Bolan parts were done decently, as always. But I have to say, I was FAR more interested in reading the Stan Reader parts. I would kinda skim when I was reading about Bolan in North Korea, but once I'd hit the Utah parts, I was glued to the page, partially because I liked testing my vocabulary. Heh. Without the Reader portions, I'd probably give this book a 7.5, which I'd round to 8. But the inclusion of Reader brings it to a solid 9. Too bad you can't make recurring characters...

This was the second Super I read by Doug and like the last one, it was very enjoyable. The opening battle with Bolan was exciting and lead to his inevitable insertion into Korea. The other storyline in Utah was okay, too, with characters introduced, more crisp gun battles and the deepening of the conspiracy. From what I gathered, the main villain was from Extreme Arsenal? Never read that one, but things weren't lost on me. Good finale scene with a grueling battle with Pave and confronting Stevens. Although the only negative I had was the comic book-ishness of Stevens, and the superhero-type names like Pave. But, another satisfying read nonetheless.

I liked this book quite a bit. The plot intrigued me right from the start and the book kept moving at a good pace. The characterization was good and there were some good action scenes, especially in the snow. I would agree with the prior review that my major complaint would be the super human nature of the Stan Reader character. It was a bit annoying to have a character who has unlimited money, knowledge, weapons, abilities, snowmobiles, etc. all at the drop of a hat. Any problem that sprung up was easily solved by Stan. But I can forgive that if the story is good and this was definately one of those cases.

Mack Bolan combats an international conspiracy involving cattle, North Korea and Salt Lake City. “Contagion Option” is the continuation of Douglas P. Wojtowicz’s anarchist cartel saga that was last seen in “Extreme Arsenal.” Bolan’s characterization is dead on here. His rage for the horrors he witnesses in North Korea fuels him throughout the novel. The was the strength of the novel is whenever he was depicted The biggest problem I had was of one of the main characters, a protagonist, named Stan Reader. He is a super-genius, super-athlete type. If Aaron Kurtzman and Gadgets Schwarz had a love child, he would almost Reader. And if Uncle Grimaldi taught him how the fly. And if Uncle Kissinger gave him a Class III weapons license... he would be Stan Reader. His flaws are strengths. He is paranoid, but that just makes him prone to buy a lot of weapons and security systems features. He also uses big words. Or as he may say: utilizes a larger range of vocabulary. The Talented Mr. Reader joins two FBI agents to form a neo-Able Team for this mission. He lobbies hard to recruit them from the beginning of the novel, presumably, so they can go on their own adventures in a spin-off book series. With such a powerful ally, the trials of the Executioner here were not challenging as they could have been. Reader is too deep of resource to find this story not very compelling. However, I would also have to recommend it.