Zero Option

Men at War #9

by Peter Kirsanow

Dick Canidy races to stop an assassin from disrupting a vital conference that will shape the course of World War II in the latest electrifying entry in W.E.B. Griffin's New York Times bestselling Men at War series.

November 1943. Stalin is pressing the Allies to open a second front in Europe in order to ease the pressure on the bloody grinding war in the East. Roosevelt and Churchill agree to meet the Soviet premier in Tehran.
Wild Bill Donovan, the charismatic leader of the OSS, has intelligence that someone is planning to assassinate either or both of the Western leaders at the conference. He sends his best agent, Dick Canidy, to thwart the plan, but how can he do that when he doesn't even know if the killer is a Nazi or an Ally?

Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction, Thriller

384 pages, Hardcover

First published July 9, 2024

About the author

Peter Kirsanow practices and teaches law and is an official of a federal agency. He is a former member of the National Labor Relations Board and has testified before Congress on a variety of matters, including the confirmations of five Supreme Court Justices. He contributes regularly to National Review, and his op-eds have appeared in newspapers ranging from The Wall Street Journal to The Washington Times. The author of Target Omega, he lives in Cleveland, Ohio.

Reviews

[Abibliofob · Rating 2 out of 5]

W.E.B. Griffin is one of my all time favorite authors The Zero Option is the second book with Peter Kirsanow as author.. It will be the 9th in the series. Sadly apart from a few names it has nothing to do with the original and I am sad to say it would have been better left undone. Everything that Dick Canidy and Eric Fulmar, two of the main characters has done in the previous seven books is gone. I mean where is Whitby house? Where is his merry band of outlaws and his disregard for authority? I also wonder why Canidy suddenly seems to have forgotten the girl he has been faithful to since book one? I also miss the attention to detail and planning of missions. I know this is fiction but the idea of the island of Gotland being an allied station from where you could be "Blown to Sweden" is such rubish. First of all Gotland is swedish. The book in itself is a good WW2 adventure and very well written but I'm sad to say it has nothing to do with the creations of Griffin. I know it's a new author but others who has been tasked with continuing a series has done a great job and this is not it. Still I would like to thank G.P. Putnam's Sons, Penguin Random House and Edelweiss for giving me this advance copy.

[Jeremy Peers · Rating 4 out of 5]

W.E.B. Griffin's "Zero Option," written by Peter Kirsanow, has received mixed reviews. People either love it or hate it, and your opinion may depend on whether you've read the previous books in the series. I enjoyed "Zero Option," but I've only read the two books by Kirsanow, so I can't compare them to earlier ones. Fans of the series might feel differently.

If you're new to the series, I think you'll like "Zero Option." I flew through it. The story is set during WWII surrounding the Big Three summit in Tehran, where the U.S., USSR, and G.B. have sent their best agents to protect their leaders. And maybe create a little chaos. It’s up to the U.S.'s Cpt. America, Dick Canidy, to stop Hitler’s goons and make sure the Soviets act like an ally.

Thanks to G.P. Putnam's & Sons for providing the galley of "Target Zero" through NetGalley.

[John · Rating 3 out of 5]

Really interested in reading this book by Peter Kirsanow, as I've read his 2 other books and they were great...this book, not so much.
The story was good, just redundant....It had a good cast of characters, the plot was good, but didn't live up to my expectations.
Thanks to PENGUIN GROUP Putnam | G.P. Putnam's Sons and NetGalley for the ARC.

[Diane Saul · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is set in WWII and is packed with action from start to finish. Although it is part of a series it could be read as a stand alone. Thank you to net galley for an advanced readers copy.

[Elaine · Rating 2 out of 5]

Sorry to say that I did not enjoy this one.
Although there were a few parts that were good, it really did not hold my interest.

Thanks to #NetGalley and #BrilliancePublishing for an ARC of the audiobook.

Zero Option by WEB Griffin, Peter Kirsanow.

2⭐️⭐️ for me.
Although I love historical fiction, especially those surrounding war times, this one just fell flat for me…

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[Lisa · Rating 1 out of 5]

So this is the first book that I have read by Mr Kirsanow not realizing that it was part of a series. After starting this book I found that I was a bit lost with the story after quickly figuring out that it was part of a series (despite looking this book up beforehand). After my realization I forged ahead with this book and found it hard to follow and a bit repetitive at times. I struggled through finishing it since it did not really hold my interest.

[John Purvis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Peter Kirsanow is the author of 4 novels. W.E.B. Griffin Zero Option was published early last month and is the 9th book in the Men at War series. It is the 62nd book I completed reading in 2024.

I received an ARC of this book through https://www.netgalley.com with the expectation of a fair and honest review. Opinions expressed here are unbiased and entirely my own! Due to scenes of violence, I categorize this novel as R.

The story begins in August of 1943. The main characters of the novel, American Army Major Dick Canidy, and First Lieutenant Eric Fulmar, are struggling to stay ahead of the German soldiers that are pursuing them. They are on a dangerous mission for the OSS to find scientist Sebastian Kapsky and get him out of occupied Poland. They barely succeed in escaping but lose important papers Kapsky was carrying to the Russians.

Both German Intelligence and the Russian NKVD see Canidy and Fulmar as obstacles. Both would like to see them eliminated. Two different groups of Brandenburgers from the Nazi Wehrmacht special forces unit are dispatched to kill the pair of Americans while they are recuperating in Gotland.

The Big Three meeting between Joseph Stalin, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Winston Churchill is scheduled for Tehran, Iran. FDR and Director of the Office of Strategic Services Bill Donovan want Canidy and Fulmar in Tehran. Both American and British intelligence believe that Tehran will be flooded with agents from their Russian ally. It is also expected that German agents may also menace the conference.

Canidy and Fulmar travel to Tehran. They are to keep their eyes open around the American, British, and Russian embassies looking for anything suspicious. The hope is that their operational experience will help them to identify any potential threat.

NKVD Major Taras Gromov had already encountered Canidy and Fulmar. Unbeknownst to them, he had assisted in their escape from the Germans in Poland. Of course, that was to further his agenda of getting hold of the Kapsky papers to advance Russian scientific research. After all, Russia was only allied to America and Britain for the defeat of Nazi Germany. Gromov was in Tehran with a mission to cause chaos at the conference. He was to implicate the Germans in a failed attempt on the lives of the big three. That, hoped the Russians, would spur America and Britain to open a new front with the Germans in the west. He also hopes to eliminate Canidy.

SS Obersturmbannführer Otto Skorzeny has been dispatched to Tehran with a group of Brandenburgers to attempt the assassination of the big three. He has just completed the spectacular rescue of Italian dictator Benito Mussolini from Italian police custody. If any German can pull off the assassination, it will be Skorzeny.

With a million residents in Tehran, the chance of Canidy and Fulmar discovering their adversaries is slim. Plotting and intrigue driven by both the Nazis and frenemy Russia permeate the city. Will Canidy and Fulmar survive? Can they prevent disruption of the conference?

I enjoyed the 10 hours I spent reading this 374-page WWII-era thriller. This action thriller is very loosely based on the real Nazi Operation Long Jump – a planned operation to assassinate the Big Three. I like the cover art, but I do not see how the image relates to the story. I give this novel a rating of 4 out of 5.

You can access more of my book reviews on my Blog ( https://johnpurvis.wordpress.com/blog/).

[Steve Harmon · Rating 2 out of 5]

Maybe I got off to a bad start on page one when Canidy fired more rounds from his M1911 than the pistol holds? I usually don’t get hung up about trivial facts, but this started on page one and set the tone. Calling Canidy and crew “operators” was laughable and again made it hard to take this book as a serious read. Agents or Commandos would be more appropriate for the time period. Again, maybe trivial, but it only told me the author didn’t do his homework.
The story was a good yarn. That why I rated this book with two stars. Other than that, Zero Option was a terrible read, nowhere in the tradition of a WEB Griffin book.
I felt like I was reading a book geared towards a middle schooler and written at that grade level. Fitting, because Canidy and Fulmar exchanges reminded me of watching Dumb and Dumber. The sophomoric attempts to portray the characters as guys being guys with Canidy, and his Soviet nemesis awestruck by the Twins was not successful and added nothing to the book.
I was left with unanswered questions. Someone was obviously passing information to the Germans but that was never addressed. I won’t go into more because of spoilers. The way characters magically just popped up was a bridge too far to take the book seriously.
Developing and setting the scene was also lacking, leaving the depth of the book lacking.
Please, Mr Kirsanow if you are going to write another book under Griffin’s name, please give us better.

[Jean Kolinofsky · Rating 4 out of 5]

Stalin is impatient for the Allie’s to open a second front against Germany. With a conference between Stalin, Churchill and Roosevelt approaching in Tehran, a plan is proposed that should force Britain and America to take action. If an assassination attempt is made against the leaders that can be blamed on the Germans, they are sure to act. Major Dick Canidy and Lieutenant Eric Fulmar are two of Donavan’s best agents in the OSS. After a disastrous rescue mission of a German scientist, they are currently recovering. They were betrayed by two Icelandic sisters who were also working for the Russians. Now they have been asked to leak the assassination attempt to Canidy. Their return is far from welcome, but they are offering to sell him information that could change the course of the war. Canidy is wary of the information but after passing it on to Washington, he and Fulmar are ordered to Tehran to gather information. It is a city teeming with spies and the two men have targets on their backs.

ZeroOption is part of the Men at War series by the late author W.E.B. Griffin, but it can be read as a stand alone. Peter Kirsanow carries on Griffin’s series with a story that is packed with action from the opening pages and will please fans of the series. I would like to thank NetGalley and Penguin Group/Putnam for providing this book.

[Barry Davidoff · Rating 1 out of 5]

WEB Griffin was one of the best action writers in recent times. I have read most of the books in several of his series.
Zero Option is far below his quality of writing. most of the characters are flat and one sided.The sucessor author did not even follow the backstory and development that Griffin already had written in the first 7 books of this series. Since Griffin already had over 2000 pages on the principal character the author could have continued in his tradition
The other problem is that an assainnation attempt at the meeting of the Big Three at the Teheran conference was chosen as the focus of the book. The book can't have any other outcome than it was unsuccessful.
Although the book has American, British, Russian and German characters they all act the same and have almost the same speech pattern. Also the author uses major historical figures like William Donavan and Secretary of War Stimson. In intriducing them he should not provide a detailed cv.
I thought that the prior volume written by the author was at best medicore, he is far below this standard in Zero Option
Rather than placing WEB Griffen on the book cover there should be a strong warning on the covver that it was not written by Griffen and is a poor imitation bordering on parody

[Kymber Jones · Rating 5 out of 5]

Peter Kirsanow's book Zero Option, is part of W.E.B. Griffin's Men at War series, and if Mr. Griffin were still alive, I would be willing to bet,he would say how wonderfully this book brings honor to his work. The action, history, military jargon, drama, and technical knowledge shown in the book gives the reader the same comfort in knowing he takes the military aspect as seriously as Mr. Griffin did, and even though the story is fiction, the events surrounding the main story is real and needs to be respected. I've read The Corps series, Brotherhood of War series, Badge of Honor series, Honor Bound series, Men at War series (up to The Spymasters), and Clandestine Operations series. I got into his books because my dad and grandmother both read his books. My dad was a Marine Corps Vietnam Vet and I am a Navy Vet. They both thought Mr. Griffin's books would be something I would enjoy and it turned out I really did enjoy the books. When Mr. Griffin passed, I was afraid there wouldn't be anyone to help carry on with his books and Mr. Griffin justice, but Mr. Kirsanow has gone beyond doing Mr. Griffin justice, and taken the Men at War series to a new level.

[Denice Langley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Book #9 in the Men at War series first started by W E B Griffin in 1998 and continued by Peter Kirsanow after Griffin's death. W E B Griffin was well known for his war series books of which there were many. His books have become favorites of veterans for their true to life accounts of soldiers and their challenges. While each of the books make a great stand alone, the series is one that many fans recommend to be read in order. Kirsanow continues Griffin's legacy, writing some of the best thrillers published recently. ZERO OPTION is set during WWII as the Allies' Commanders will meet to plan the next strategies against the Nazi. Intelligence has alerted to an assasination plot against the Commanders with Dick Canidy deployed to stop the attempt. As Canidy and his team search for clues, he must first insure the safety of these VIPs.

[Marc-Oliver Mögle · Rating 1 out of 5]

To be honest - a waste of time - a book- which can be read by slipping the pages with a short look

Ehrlich gesagt, wie kann man aus lauter Profitgier so ein Machwerk verfassen?

Wer die Reihe kennt, erkennt sofort, dass der Sub-Autor sie nicht kennt. Man missbraucht zwei bekannte Namen und nimmt keine Rücksicht auf den Original-Plot. Das alleinige Nennen von historischen Personen macht es nicht besser.

In beiden Romanen ist die Handlung primitiv und historisch macht vieles keinen Sinn. Skorzeny und die Brandenburger??? In der US-Wahrnehmung… weiter weg von der Realität geht es gar nicht. Dazu isländische weibliche Söldner? Und Soviets mit Millionen Dollars - klar …

Ich bedaure, dass ich spontan beide Werke gekauft habe. Schon der erste war nichts. Der Autor hat nicht mal Frontverläufe richtig recherchiert.

Weitere Bände spar ich mir.

[Ron Baumer · Rating 4 out of 5]

I will admit that the second book written by Mr. Kirsanow was a better novel than the first one (The Devil's Weapons). In this book the author stays closer to the original characters developed by WEB Griffin in the original series. The story was fast paced and full of action and does a good job of picking up where the first novel left off. From the book, one can infer there will be additional books to add to the series.

However, for those readers who enjoyed the original series, these books do not follow the series well and the interaction with the characters is missing. The new author has lost some of the more important characters and in reality, only has kept Cannidy, Fulmer and Donovon.

Thank you to #NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

[Kevin · Rating 3 out of 5]

To me this novel in the Men At War series deserves 3.75 stars.

This novel, written by a talented author, Peter Kirsanow, aptly reflected the style of W.E.B. Griffin very well.

As written by reviewer Peter Clenott on the Historical Novel Society, "The novel has plenty of action, though in a generic seen-it-all-before fashion. "

If you have read one of the previous eight in the series, then you will agree with his assessment. But there is something comforting and familiar about it, for certain.

It you like any of Griffin's novels, then you will enjoy this one - I did.

If you want to enjoy Peter Kirsanow's writing in full, then try one of his Mike Garin novels. I am looking forward to the next one.

[Greer Andjanetta · Rating 3 out of 5]

Yet another example of a would-be novelist writing a book based on characters and themes of an accomplished author who has died . The story, set in WW II describes an attempt by the Germans to assassinate Stalin, Churchil and Rooseveldt at the Tehran conference. The story is well-enough written with an intriguing plotline and could well have stood on its own without having to use someone else's ideas and characters.

[Dallas Carr · Rating 2 out of 5]

Definitely not the best. Griffins books are a far better read than Kirsanow's. Didn't really tie into any of the previous books of the series besides having Canidy, Fulmar, and McDermott as characters. Some books you can read multiple times and be great every time. This is not one of them. Would not recommend reading a second time through.

[Charles Zachman · Rating 4 out of 5]

I like the main characters. Peter Kirsanow is doing okay with the series, this book just seemed to me to bounce a little too much. I understand why, but at times was a little much. I would still recommend this book.

[Bob Morrison · Rating 3 out of 5]

Roosevelt,Churchill and Stalin set to meet in Tehran- Soviets want to have an attempted assassination to force US and Britain to invade from the west- Germans want and actual assassination- OSS boss Donavan sends Canidy and Fulmar to stop it all

[Becky · Rating 5 out of 5]

An interesting take on the World War 2 summit between Russia, England and the USA and how Germany wanted to intercede. I appreciate that the heroes of the book aren’t infallible. While part of a series this can be read separately without a challenge.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

Typical WEB Griffin book. Lots of action, although sometimes I feel like the author is getting paid by the word -- how many times do I need to see all of Winston Churchill's names, how many times do I need to see a characters full rank and name? I am looking forward to the next book, though.

[Andrea · Rating 3 out of 5]

Yet another loaner from my neighbor. The story certainly zips along, but I had a hard time keeping the Russians and Germans straight, and I'm not a fan of cliff hanger endings that are just a set-up for the next book in the series. That being said, not a bad read.

[PottWab Regional Library]

O

[Gregg · Rating 3 out of 5]

Decent book. However it is not WEB Griffin. The author needs to add plot points and stop repeating ideas two or three times a paragraph.

[Tom · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good WWII fiction with compelling characters.

[Robert Knorr · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 ⭐️rating.

[Caren · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really enjoyed the slight humorous slant that these books have in their characters.

[Matthew · Rating 2 out of 5]

Eh this was slow moving and not very interesting.

[Suzy Howell · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not the same caliber as the original WEB Griffin books. Too much repetition and not enough actual action

[Steve · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.25