James Bond-ish action thriller, somewhat similar in plot to Vince Flynn's "Memorial Day", except this one takes place on Inauguration Day. Discovering the plot, Brits and ex-CIA types team up to take on Islamic-terrorist group planning to blow up Washington, D.C. and take out the U.S. Government. The book bounces around some between the Amazon region in Brazil, Texan-Mexican border towns, and Washington, D.C. While the action changes aren't completely seamless, it's still easy to follow and give you what you want from books of this type. ( )

I really enjoyed this book. ( )

Non-stop action and (for once) plausible villains make for very good entertainment. This author never disappoints and deserves more appreciation from the political thriller fans. ( )

Totally implausible plot. Waste of time. ( )

Hidden deep in the Amazon Rainforest, Islamic terrorist Muhammad Top is planning an attack. The target: America. The method: Unknown – and it is up to British MI6 officer Alex Hawke to find out. Previously a slave under Top, he had managed to escape. After recovering in Britain, he and Scotland Yard Inspector Ambrose Congreve visit a dying German ambassador named Zimmermann who worked for Top. As he dies, he gives them a coded message for his wife that details Top’s attack. If they can decode it, they could possibly save America and stop Top. Over in America, Stokely Jones – who works for Hawke – finds high tech missiles from Venezuela which could be used to attack America. Trouble is also brewing along the Mexican border. Illegal immigrants and drugs are smuggled over the border daily, girls are being kidnapped, and police officers like Prairie, Texas sheriff Franklin Dixon can do very little to stop the Mexicans, who are in league with the Islamic terrorists. Hawke, along with Congreve and Jones, are America’s only hope of survival, as they head back into the belly of the beast to either take down Top or die trying.
Spy by Ted Bell is an action/adventure novel that deals with the rise of terrorism in South America and the violence of the drug cartels in Mexico. Both of these are threateningly real situations today, and are very dangerous to America. In real life, drugs are smuggled over the border daily, and terrorists have attacked America before (such as 9/11). This made it very easy to connect to Spy, as I have heard similar things in the news, and makes the events in the book seem real to me. One of the book’s themes is how foreign enemies invade America, and as Sheriff Franklin Dixon said “A border ain’t nothin’ but a law drawn in the sand.” Similar to a line in the sand, which can be ignored or altered easily, a border is useless. Since there is nothing but a law to stop drug smugglers and terrorists from crossing the border, and the law means nothing to them, they cross the border anyways. This puts the lives of Americans at risk, as terrorists could easily get into America unnoticed, and people can be attacked by illegal immigrants, both of which happen in the book. Another of the book’s themes is self-sacrifice, risking one’s own life to try to save others. Alex Hawke, Ambrose Congreve, and Stokely Jones all do this when they venture into the Amazon Rainforest to attempt to prevent Muhammad Top’s attack. I thought Spy was a great book, and would recommend it to anyone, especially people who love action/adventure books. Every page in Spy is full of action, and I could not put it down once I had started reading it. -J.C.