July 8, 2024
Juan Cabrillo and his crew aboard the warship Oregon face off against a brilliant and evil arms dealer in the entertaining latest Oregon Files adventure (after Golden Buddha). The action opens during WWII, when an American airman is captured and imprisoned in a Japanese research center for chemical and biological weapons. In the present, a sadistic gunrunner known only as “the Vendor” has been selling $80 billion in weaponry abandoned after America withdrew from Afghanistan. The U.S. government taps Cabrillo to figure out who’s behind the transactions. Eventually, he leads his team—with the addition of beautiful and brainy engineer Callie Cosima, who designs state-of-the-art submersibles—to the Vendor’s remote, booby-trapped island in the Bismarck Sea, where they fight flame-breathing robots and other obstacles. Maden effortlessly weaves subplots about the American POW and the Vendor’s scheme to unleash biotoxins into the main action, which is vivid, bloody, and occasionally jaw-dropping. This fires on all cylinders. Agent: Peter Lampack, Peter Lampack Agency.
Starred review from September 1, 2024
TheOregon crew takes on a villain who bears a long-festering grudge. In 1945, a captured American soldier unwillingly took part in a ghastly experiment. In the current day, a malign force has built on that research and plans to wreak unholy vengeance on Guam and, ultimately, on the United States. A mysterious, much-feared man called the Vendor, an arms purveyor whose increasingly dangerous weapons have just slaughtered soldiers in Niger, is testing his killing craft in the Indian Ocean. The Vendor's reach extends as far as Kosovo and the Celebes Sea off the Philippines, where North Koreans try out some of his handiwork. Luckily, a modest-looking cargo ship plies the seas. It's theOregon, with all the internal wizardry one might wish for. It has a Cray computer, Cordon Bleu-trained chefs, and plenty of amenities to keep a top-notch crew dedicated. The seawater-powered ship can even change its outward appearance to disguise itself as the lowliest third-world rust bucket. In charge of this marvel is Juan Cabrillo, the protagonist. The crew of theOregon are independent contractors and undertake an urgent mission from the CIA to investigate arms trafficking by the Taliban. That leads to an inevitable collision with the Vendor, whose tentacles reach far and wide. This might spell the end for Cabrillo because the Vendor "had proven himself unequaled in unarmed combat." The Oregon Files series is always fun, and this episode is no exception. Cabrillo is a terrific leader in top physical shape, but he and the ship itself are tested to their limits. Of course, some ofOregon's features beggar belief, but never you mind. They fit in well with the now-and-then over-the-top writing: "A giant piece of red-hot aluminum sliced through Juan's fragile canopy like a drunken samurai's katana through a rice-paper wall." It's hard to read a simile like that and not stop and smile. And in the same action sequence, the hero hits an object "like a speeding hockey forward cross-checking a parked Zamboni." Ouch. It all "hurt like the dickens," which is about as salty as the language gets. Exciting adventure that's worthy of the Cussler name.
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