Plot:
This was a fun one. Kind of like Jersey Guns without Bolan being injured and with a lot of snow. Bolan has been suckered into a trap, drawn to Colorado by whisperings of a "supersoft operation." In reality, a military-trained force of hundreds of soldiers (yes, hundreds) led by a decorated Captain who Bolan knew from Vietnam is working for the Mafia to take down Bolan once and for all -- or so we think. Actually the whole lure-in-Bolan-to-kill-him mission is just a readiness test of sorts for the real mission: Kidnapping the president and the whole first family. Twist!
What makes this like Jersey Guns is that Bolan is run to ground by a Bolan-hunting party, having to save himself and the lives of two civilians caught up in the whole mess. Fortunately, a sudden blizzard provides the cover Bolan needs to sneak around and infiltrate the enemy forces, defeating them from within.
Note to self: I wonder if Bolan saving the president will factor into the official pardon that's coming at the end of the Pendleton era books.
As ridiculous as the plot to kidnap the president seems, it serves a really interesting story function. Finding himself up against an overwhelmingly superior force, Bolan's instinct is to use the blizzard to escape to live to fight another day. But when he learns of their real intentions and the blizzard prevents him from getting word out to save the president (who is already in Colorado for a ski vacation with his family -- why the Secret Service wouldn't rush him out of the state the second they learned that Bolan is in town leaves me scratching my head, but that's a whole other conversation), Bolan realizes that he is the only one who can prevent the Mafia's sinister plan! So he has to do the hardest thing he's ever done in this 25-chapter war against the Mafia: He must try to defeat an army of top soldiers led by a seasoned veteran who is on par with Bolan himself. Can he do it???
Yup. And he does it in 9 pages.
Well, I guess he actually makes the decision to take on the whole army by himself with 40 pages left. But most of that is infiltration and info gathering in order to form his plan, which he executes in 9 pages. This is some crazy kind of writing that Pendleton does in this series.
One last thing I'll say about the story: I really enjoyed how early in the book Bolan questions himself and whether or not he can continue his war. After surviving that initial ambush, Bolan learns that some of the ambushers he killed were US military. At that point, he's unsure whether they're actual military, former soldiers turned mercenaries, or mobsters disguised as military. It's that first possibility that haunts him for a bit, really shakes him up. It makes me think about how interesting it would have been if Pendleton had ever explored what would happen to Bolan if he did accidentally kill a good guy. Sadly, a series this profitable leaves no room for the main character to cross that line.
Guest Appearances:
Hal Brognola and Leo Turrin both feature prominently in this story. Bolan only connects with them by phone, but we get a few scenes of them (Brognola and Turrin) interacting outside of Bolan's storyline. Most interestingly, after Bolan misses a check in call and is unreachable for like half a day, Brognola and Turrin conclude that he must have finally met his match. They don't know about the blizzard, and he's never been this late for a contact. And so they actually mourn his death. It's quite revealing in a characterization sense. Beyond their personal affection for the man, they were both heavily invested in Bolan's ability to possibly do what they never could: Defeat the Mafia. I think it's a surprise to both of them and makes for an interesting insight into these two mainly peripheral characters.
There's also a short 2-page phone call with Toni Blancanales, sister of Death Squand veteran, Pol Blancanales.
Timeline:
The main clue I could find as to time of year is the reference to the president's tradition of traveling to Colorado for the beginning of ski season, the first real snowfall in the state. Historically, that could be as early as October but more likely November. With respect to how much time has passed since Canadian Crisis, Bolan mentions "ten patient days of quiet probing" in Colorado before the ambush that opens the book. But that doesn't tell us anything about what he was doing before that.