Time Bomb

I obviously wasn't as engaged in this as previous reviewers were. It was a good story even though I found that The Ghoul killed a little too easily and the psychology was a little amateurish. I do agree that there were only a few hangers on to the Ghoul so this meant the whole book was more of a one on one between Ghoul and the Executioner. It is certainly one to read, but not my favorite to date.

How good is this ? Answer BRILLIANT/SUPERB/NOVEL/NEW/ORIGINAL etc. etc. Where to start well the main villian is someone you haven't met before believe me, who is a brilliant/super rich/explosives/brainwashing expert who has come up with maybe the ultimate plot to complete his warped idea of what should happen on this planet. Very hard here to say anything without giving away what the title is all about. Bombs are detonated by supposed zombies resulting in massive casualties and the body count is souring. MANY MANY sections of this title to praise as right from the start three different threads emerge and all are excellent especially the third where you are really starting to wonder how the big guy is going to get out of this. Now let me state here you will read some ORIGINAL STUFF if you decide to read this. If you have read heaps of this gear and are jaded with rewrite after rewrite grab this YOU HAVEN'T READ THIS BEFORE! The title keeps you rivetted as the pages fly by and you will be impressed by some VERY creative writing, lots of original stuff here and there are no armies of mercs/terrorists/mafia/spetnez etc. it is just the big fella against the bomber. Mind games and some brilliant stuff from the Stony Man Team results in the first of many showdowns between them resulting in a brilliant "finish" at a place where both the American President and the VP are currently located. BUT he escapes and off we go again, dialogue between Mack and Hal passing on what the President would like to happen is of course absorbed, digested and ignored and the finale is beautiful stuff EXACTLY what the BIG GUY would do in the situation he is in and after what was said. Hey it is up to you this author is not recommended by a lot of people on this site which is unfortunate BUT if you decide to read this please let this community know what you thought as we are all waiting!!!! This is excellent HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!! Do yourself a favour and read this one. Can I rave on anymore regarding this title? By The way did I mention ORIGINAL !!!!!!! LOVED IT

I really enjoyed this book. THis is the second book i have read, my first one was Border War. It was much better. I just finished it today. My favorite part was probobly the part with the mall. I like how the auther made the villian ... well evil. My next will either be Serpents Lair or Vigilante Run, I might read it during my composition class. Can't wait.

“A toxic gas might not spread fast enough, poison is too unpredictable and a machine gun is too passe,” explains the Ghoul, an Orwellian-deranged psychotic in “Time Bomb.” As the title suggests, he is a bomber. He also uses a different flavor of suicide bomber than the ones most commonly used. The novel begins with three short stories of Bolan going after the top bomb builders in North America. These raids are loosely connected to the overall plot, but supply the requisite amount of gunplay required for the series. Taken separately, they are quality, complete with their own separate characters, problems and surprising resolutions. The remainder of this novel is the hunt for the psycho. Bolan’s characterization is consistent with the series. He counts victories not by the number of enemies he killed, but by the number of lives he saved. He works up a real hatred towards the Ghoul. It’s understandable and yet fascinating to watch Bolan unravel in response to a smirking, leering psychopath who loves to blow things up. What the novel did not have, that I was mildly disappointed with, was Bolan confronting one of the human time bombs. They are not suicide bombers, but they are brainwashed innocents that could be saved. To what length would Bolan try to save them? That’s a question that needed asking. This book also shares a title with a Phoenix Force entry in the ‘80s. Their “Time Bomb” referred to the political powder keg of apartheid. It’s too bad the Executioner’s entry came out was a month late.. #321 would have been a more apt number preceding the words, time bomb.

Different, dark and for most part mystic and fun…………… Gould was a very psycho villain with a twisted mind and sick way of live and a bit of a mystic aura around him with his blind hatred and inner rage and it is rare to have a great devious madman like this one who is made very clear as a person in these books. Man, Gould was sick to the bone and didn´t have any remorse in killing innocent people just to satisfy his mad personality or just to get away from Bolan. The best part of the book was actually every time Gould appeared whether is was with his own thoughts or interacting with his patients and their “conditioning”. Gould is one of the most memorable villain the Mack Bolan saga so far and a rare gem among many lame villains in many of the books in the past. The book does suffer a bit as the Gould appearance was so strong and powerful that the non Gould part of the book was much lesser instead so the extremes of the book very clear and clean cut. If you want to read a book with a very strong and powerful villain presence, then read this one. The Gould is worth it!!! (Iceland – 2006)

This is an incredibly fast moving book that seems to be one violent confrontation after another. A book with a massive death toll that sees Bolan using all of Stony Man’s resources to hunt The Ghoul down. Highlights for me was seeing how The Ghoul seemed to be one step ahead of Bolan all the time, the shopping centre chase, the tension filled approach to a farm... I also smiled at the inclusion of some comments about comic books being one of the few pure American art forms. And I was amazed at the facts and figures revealed on page 104 of how many people go missing each year. After the continuous action of the rest of the book the final scenes seemed understated in comparison, which for me made the finale all the more powerful.

An excellent entry in the Bolan series. This book had just about every aspect of the Bolan series covered: great villain, great action, a Bolan Blitz to hunt down bombing suspects, just the right touch of Stony Man & Brognola to help Bolan out and great plot devices. I really liked the canoe chase down the river in upstate New York. The ending & final fate of The Ghoul as was good. I docked it a point for only one reason though: The Ghoul was too good a villain to kill off in just one book, he should've gotten away for Bolan to face another time.

This book had that comic book feel all over it. The Ghoul was a very impressive villain and I really liked just how evil the dude was. The ending was excellent because it felt like when mel gibson chained the punk to the burning vehicle at the end of MAD MAX. The Ghoul is right up there as one of my favorite literary villains along with the joker, dr. doom and the red skull.

This novel is one of the better books that I have read in sometime with this particular series. I have been steadly been reading this series since about 1981. During my 10 years in the Army, these books helped with the passing of dead time. I like the raw emotional charge of the story. I thought most of the Bolan books had lost some of the edgyness that I once knew. I like the web of connections that Bolan does to connect to the Ghoul. Early, in the book Bolan does a Bolan like blitz like in the early novels. I missed that in some of the other recent books.