Athena Project by Brad Thor

The Athena Project by Brad Thor

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

When a terrorist attack in Rome kills more than twenty Americans, Athena Team members Gretchen Casey, Julie Ericsson, Megan Rhodes, and Alex Cooper are tasked with hunting down the Venetian arms dealer responsible for providing the explosives. But there is more to the story than anyone knows.

As Casey, Ericsson, Rhodes, and Cooper close in on their target, they will soon learn that another attack—one of unimaginable proportions—has already been set in motion, and the greatest threat they face may be the secrets kept by their own government

My Take: Who is this Brad Thor? Why have I not been reading his books all along? This book is action-packed with a very well developed story and twists and turns. I was actually burned out from reading yet I could not. put. this. down.

Why I liked this story: Thor creates a Delta team of all female members. They are intelligent, athletic, strong, beautiful and follow orders. Not only that but they have access to all the super cool gadgets the male spies seem to always have. This is the anti James Bond. They are just as skilled as any Bond but instead of being the token arm and bed candy, the women are the protagonists.

I hate James Bond movies. Being married to a man, I have seen more James Bond movies than I ever care to see again. I would love to watch an Athena Project movie.

Another point is that this book is essentially clean. There is no unnecessary sex scenes. In fact, I don't recall any sex scenes, although innuendo is included in some spy scenes. It was refreshingly clean. Language is minimal. There is guard who drops the F bomb right before he gets shot. Besides that - nothing offensive.

Dialogue is fun and clever. The team enjoys camaraderie that rivals the Ya Ya Sisterhood.

The story scares the crap out of me. I loved it. Imagine harnessing the space/time continuum enough to send an electromagnetic bomb through and have it detonate in a populated city. Bad guys in Yugoslavia or Siberia with machine, send through bomb, hits San Francisco, detonates, and magnetizes that city. Power grids go down. All computers are wiped clean. Credit cards don't swipe. DVR won't record. I bet it would even kill my Kindle.

THIS is why I refuse to go paperless on all banking accounts, thank you very much! And yet I don't carry large amounts of cash. See how scary this can be?

Back to the story - Loved it! Exciting, thoroughly entertaining, and written in layman's terms.