'Patriot Games' by Tom Clancy
'Patriot Games' by Tom Clancy

The good

  • The opening is quite strong: lots of action, some heroics, a little bit of humor, and a little bit of detective work.

  • The ending is pretty suspenseful and action packed too.

  • There are some interesting glimpses at the CIA, FBI, and US military. As well as some imagined glimpses at how a terrorist cell might operate.

  • A few interesting characters, including Jack Ryan and his buddies.

The not so good

  • In between the exciting opening and conclusion, there’s just a lot of boring, slow-moving, seemingly pointless filler. The book spends way too long on Jack’s life at home, his job at the naval academy, his work at the CIA, and a whole bunch of other stuff. It’s a 600 page book, so we’re talking about ~400 pages of content that mostly goes nowhere. There are literally hundreds of pages spent investigating and trying to track the terrorists down, but it comes to absolutely nothing, as they never even come close to actually catching them.

  • A little too much “rah rah America” for my tastes.

  • Some of the characters, such as Jack’s wife, feel flat, mostly there to move the plot along.

Rating: 3.5 stars