The Camel Club is Back

The Camel Club is back - in The Collectors by David Baldacci. Oliver Stone and the other members of the Camel Club are searching for the truth. Following are some of the questions that have to be answered in this book.

The U.S. Speaker of the House has been murdered and a terrorist group has reportedly claimed responsibility. Is this the truth?

The director of the Library of Congress ends of dead inside the rare book collection vault. There is no apparent cause for his death. Could his death have been murder? Is there a connection between his death and the murder of the U.S. Speaker?

Caleb Shaw has been named as the executor for his deceased boss’ personal rare book collection. He discovers a rare book of the Psalm’s in a hidden safe in the vault. Where and how did this book come to be in this collection?

The neighbor to the director of the Library of Congress is a crooked defense contractor. He is considered a suspect in the deaths of the U.S. Speaker of the House and the director of the Library of Congress. He is shot and one of the members of the Camel Club becomes a suspect. Why is he killed and who killed him?

A con artist is introduced. She comes to DC and helps the Camel Club. What is her connection? Will she hang around?

These are just a portion of the questions the Camel Club are looking at. The best way to see how they do is to read the book – and I think it is worth it.

I Want The Truth

"I Want The Truth". These are the word on the sign on a tent overlooking the White House. This is the goal of the group that bears the name also used as the title of this book - "The Camel Club" by David Balducci. And what a web of political intrigue is built into this book. There are several persons of interest that make up this story - the first in a series of three written with the Camel Club involved.

The leader of the Camel Club calls himself "Oliver Stone". He is joined by three others in this group to seek out and expose the truth. The other members are Caleb Shaw, Milton Farb, and Reuben Rhodes. They are having a secret meeting when they stumble upon a murder. When they are almost caught at the scene by the killers, they decide to determine the reason behind the murder. They have no idea the plot behind this murder is about.

Also involved in the investigation of this murder are a couple of agents in the Secret Service since the murder victim had a highly sensitive job involving a national intelligence database. These agents are Alex Ford and Jackie Simpson. The murder appears to be related to the victim's "supposed" involvement with drugs. Alex is aquainted with the person who calls himself "Oliver Stone" and he decides to look further into the murder when Oliver questions him it. Neither he or Oliver realize just how involved they will be.

I do not want to give away too much regarding the story. Suffice it to say that it involves terrorism, intelligence, and a twist of plots by several characters.

Was it something I enjoyed reading? Did it keep my attention? You bet!!! Would I be inclined to read the other two books in this collection - The Collectors and Stone Cold? With out a doubt these two books are on my list of books to read.

A Red, White, and Blue Thriller

Vince Flynn writes about one of my favorite characters - Mitch Rapp who is a CIA operative. I just finished his latest book – Protect and Defend. Mitch is always effective in what he does and in this book it is no different. However, the things Mitch does are not always thought to be the right thing. This is why a lot of the things he does are done in secret. As a reader of these “fictional” accounts, we know what he is doing and, in a lot of cases, why. This makes it easier to accept what he does. He seems to be different from how in general we view the actual CIA. Or maybe it is because the CIA is so secret and we do not know what they are doing (or more importantly why they are doing it and how they justify it) that we have a different view? I think it is easier to accept a fictional account with it’s justifications a lot easier than a real live account where the justifications are a little fuzzy.

Case in point … the book opens with Mitch and a partner tracking down a character from a previous book – Stu Garrett. Only a few people (as well as the reader) know the kind of person Stu Garrett is and what he has done. His purpose was to help a political party elected to the White House but his method was one that was wrong. The wife of the vice presidential candidate (and others) were blown up by terrorists because of him. Is this a justified way to help get the party elected to office? He would use any way he felt necessary to accomplish his purpose. He was a heartless “person”.

Mitch tracks him down, kills him, and makes it look like an accident. If this was not a fictional account and had we not known what we knew, would this be justifiable? I think it is the things you do not know that make some things hard to accept.

There was a secret facility being built to develop nuclear bombs in Iran – sound familiar? Only a few knew about the facility and only a few knew about plans to bomb it. When it was bombed, the powers in Iran pointed the finger at Israel and the United States for doing it. They also indicated it the facility was to develop power - not bombs. In spite of proof otherwise, they proceeded to incite their country and others into a confrontation with the US and Israel.

Irene Kennedy who was Mitch’s boss is sent to quietly defuse the situation. She meets with somebody in the Iran government in Iraq. What they do not realize is that others in the Iranian government know about this and kidnap Irene. Their plans are to discredit the US and to torture Irene and to get top secret information from her. This upsets Mitch and he plans to do anything to get her back. He captures some of the ones who were in the raid that kidnapped Irene. He uses torture to get information about the kidnapping of Irene. While the torture done by the Iranians is considered evil, the torture done by Mitch is somewhat justifiable to those of us who know what is going on.

Anyway, Mitch successfully locates and rescues Irene but this does not end the story. The terrorist responsible for her kidnapping escaped but is hunted down. He is in a prison in Lebanon. Using some influences and bribes, Mitch goes to the prison, confronts the terrorist, and kills him in the interrogation room. Sound similar to the beginning of the book?

Of interest was the way the Iranian government was portrayed in this book. You have the good people and you have the bad people. And then you have those in the government who keep themselves out of the middle of it and wait until they see the outcome before they take a stand. Interesting!!!

Profile of A. Cross

James Patterson writes and is a co-author of several series. Alex Cross is a profiler in one of his series. So far there are 13 books in the series. I just read the 12th book in the series and it is simply called Cross. The book backs up several years in the past to events that affect Alex in the current. Alex has memories of his wife who was murdered back then. The person suspected of killing his wife disappeared but is back now.

This book has short chapters. I suspect the average length per chapter is 3-4 pages. I do not think the length of the chapters takes anything away from the book. Instead I feel the length of these is one of the reasons I was able to finish the book so soon. You get to the end of a chapter and feel you can read another.

There were other things that held my attention. The series has some constant characters other than Alex Cross. One of these characters is Sampson – a childhood friend and a member of the DC police. Sampson is one of those types of people who do best working by himself (unless he is working with Alex) and does not care what others think about him. When Alex leaves the FBI and sets up a private practice, Sampson asks for help and a personal favor with a rape case. They discover later that the case and several others are related and point to the Butcher. This is when the case becomes more than personal to Alex who has not been able to get over his wife’s death those many years ago.

Another perennial character is Nana – Alex’s Grandmother. She raised Alex and she takes care of the family. Nobody will “cross” Nana – not Alex, his kids, or even Sampson. She is one of the main reasons Alex decides to leave the FBI in this book. He knows he needs her especially when she threatens to leave him. As we know and are reminded through this series, Nana has been a big influence in Alex’s life as well as an important influence on his kids.

A good part of the book deals with the Butcher. We find he had his “influences” as well that lead him to become what he was. He is a professional hit man for the mob and anybody who would want his services. He is a cruel rapist who manipulates the ones he rapes to convince them not to say anything to the police. And when the ladies he has raped talks to somebody else about the rape, he goes back to them and tells them they are responsible for him killing them. As we know early in the book (and Alex finds out later), the butcher killed a lady he raped who talked to Alex’s wife who was a social worker trying to help her. It was shortly after the butcher killed that lady when Alex’s wife was killed. Although Alex did not know this connection, he suspected the butcher was responsible for his wife’s death.

The Butcher (Michael Sullivan) turned partially into what he became because of his father who was a butcher in a meat shop. His father was mean to his family and we learn he also sexually molested Michael. Later Michael got a gun and threatened his father. He told him he was going to let him live for now but he would get him when he least expected it. Later he kills his father, cuts him up in little pieces, and feeds him to the fish in the bay.

In this book, the butcher is being sought by the mob, the police, the FBI, as well as Alex Cross. He escapes several attempts on his life by the mob and goes after them. He gets so pumped up he seeks out and commits more rapes. Finally Alex and Sampson get a good lead on him. Mike gets caught in between Alex and Sampson, and a group from the mob. Alex has doubts that Mike killed his wife when the butcher tells him he didn’t do it. It looks like he will get away and will kill Alex in this mess but Sampson kills him before he does.

Sometime after the incidence, Sampson tells Alex he killed the person responsible for Maria Cross. There was another person working with the butcher. It was not until this time that he was able to say anything about it. Knowing the person responsible is dead is the start to Alex being able to recover.

But this is not the end. In the last chapter, Alex gets a phone call and the caller tells him there has been a murder. Alex asks why he was called ant the response was “Because you’re Dr Cross and I’m the murderer.” Sound like the lead in to the next book? We’ll see.