Xing

Contains spoilers pertaining to the first two books.

Three, barely there (and I'm being generous here), stars.

Its taken three books, but we finally get somewhere with the plot involving Prophet's old friend/lover/possible traitor – John. And to be quite honest, I really could care less at this point. Because it was never the (confusing) plot that gripped me about the series. It was always the interaction between Prophet and Tom.

The first book established their relationship. The second book allowed us to glimpse into Tom's past. The third book didn't really do much except for shedding light on some of Prophet's issues, a few relationship developments and progressing the plot.

In terms of the plot and mission, I felt it was very lacking. S.E. Jakes has this tendency of just writing things to conveniently progress the story or mission. They need a transmitter to keep track of a certain someone? Well, look here! There just so happens to be this super awesome transmitter (vouched for by one of the characters, who has used it for FIVE years), that automatically shuts off when a person is being scanned to help evade detection (but won't shut off when being scanned by the right people); that ALSO leaves the impression of scarred tissue where it is implanted so not to reveal itself.

How convenient.

There are, rather, several situations that just happened, yet should have been far from plausible given the circumstances.

And I wished there was more explanation into Prophet's eye condition. I don't need a whole science journal on the condition, but the unrealistic transmission along the genetic line with no pathological explanation for what is actually happening makes it feel just way too over-the-top and unbelievable.

And to be honest, I'm getting tired of the invincible Prophet. Now add his team of old SEAL buddies that all happen to be uber alpha-men that (through the author's writing) makes it feel like they can each take over a third-world country blind folded. There's absolutely no suspense in this book, as the author has made these characters unrealistically inhumane and indestructible thus far.

The story, around 65-80% of the way in, felt like it derailed. I was trying to figure out what happened to the plot, and what the significance of the things happening were. Unfortunately, I never really figured it out.

But it wasn't all bad. The little bit of development between Prophet and Tom were still nice to read. As usual, the erotic scenes were well written and at least things were fast paced (when the book stayed on track, anyways).

Anyways, this was my least favorite entry into the series. I'm hoping the next one will do better.