Blood guts and action to the Max

.. .. .. .. .. .. .. Officially Max Mclean does not exist. His parents were Russian immigrants who settled in Ireland where Max was born and raised as Irish. At 16 he was left an orphan.

Max was accepted into the British Army at

16. At 19 he was recruited as a hitman for the British secret service.

Now considerably older, he has turned down a top promotion, and is embarking on what he considers his last mission.

After a week of careful surveillance Max carries out this mission only to discover someone has been there before him.

As he prises a banknote, with the cryptic message “Arkhangel” scrawled on it, from the victim’s hands Max is attacked. He has walked into a trap.

Max manages to escape and makes his way bleeding and wounded to his old friend Doc who bandages him up, removes a bullet (gruelling reading) and puts him up for the night. In the morning he comes downstairs and finds Doc shot, blood and guts everywhere.

The Garda arrive en mass. Max, singlehanded, keeps them at bay from an upstairs window, shoots down a police helicopter and makes his escape to the coast. Surrounded once again he is picked up by a Russian trawler and hands, legs and feet bound he is hung upside down in a container.

He makes his escape from here dives into the sea and swims to the coast.

I am beginning to think James Bond, but without any special effects. Perhaps the Six Million Dollar Man. Now, half dead, he is taken to hospital under police guard. Enlisting the help of a young doctor, he makes his way to Paris.

And we are barely quarter of the way through. The novel continues with countless deaths and splattered guts, through France, Israel, and Russia where Max finally solves the mystery, saves the world and lives perhaps to save the world again at a future date.

The writing is great, descriptive prose a bit much for me and it’s not really my sort of crime story. But I have friends and relations who think my favourite crime stories are bland, and lack action. Arkhangel is going to be a winner for them.

Move over Jack Reacher, Jack Ryan. Max Mclean, alias Mac Ghill’ean, is about to push you off that pedestal. —