Effected Intent

by Alan Ross

Steve Pfister is a reticent polymer chemist who lives in the past, unable to let go of his military experience. His latest invention gets the attention of some high level government officials, leading to an opportunity to work on a top secret project with national security implications.


Life couldn’t be more routine for computer programmer Bill Miller, until he stumbles on information that he shouldn’t have, including a bioterrorism plot. Unable to come forward with the information, he needs to find an ally to believe him before it’s too late.

ebook

First published January 7, 2010

About the author

Alan Ross (1922-2001) was a poet, writer, journalist, editor and publisher. In fact, he was a man of letters par excellence. Born in India, educated in England, he joined the Royal Navy in the Second World War and endured the Arctic convoys to Russia. Alan Ross took over The London Magazine (the definite article was later dropped) from John Lehmann and revitalized it. There, it has been said, 'he simplified as well as unified contemporary culture by the clarity of his unique editorial taste. He also discovered many new talents.' His writing embraced poetry, cricket journalism, biography, autobiography, criticism and travel writing.

Reviews

[Gayle England-Triplett · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very technical about the web.

I enjoyed the story although I was lost with all the web technical explanations. The story starts out very different from the expected ending scenario.

[Laura · Rating 2 out of 5]

The writing of this book is really, really bad. The author mentions that he wrote the beginning some years earlier, and it shows - the beginning is much better grammatically and has a completely different feel. The plot was fine, enough that I would have given this three stars, but I could not get past the poor writing, which seeemed to get worse as the plot got more exciting. I have built up quite a tolerance for typos after reading so many Kindle freebies, but this was something else. There was a lot of dull filler content, sort of like reading the blog of someone who describes their entire mundane day in excruciating detail. Additionally, a lot of characters don't really play a role, the dialogue is very unnatural, and there is a lot of switching between tenses. I know that the tenses sounds like a nitpicky detail, but it was pretty extreme and very distracting. It's sad that poor writing and editing killed this book for me, which was otherwise fine (but not great).

[Eric · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a solid thriller with strong characters and varied sub plots. It is a very modern tale, centered on bio-terrorism, and cyberspace intrigue. I feel as though Mr. Ross did an excellent job developing all aspects of the story and it is an entertaining read overall.

As to why I gave it only three stars...the editing left much to be desired. Though it may sound picky, typos and other copy errors can ruin what is otherwise a great effort by an author. If you look past these things, then Effected Intent is worthy of another star based on the merits of the story. I would not be reluctant to read more by this author.

[Charles Vrooman · Rating 2 out of 5]

The plot for this novel was okay but had a fragmented storyline. For a thriller it took forever before any action to take place and grab the reader’s interest. It was hard to know if you were reading something from the past or present. It would have helped if the author had used dates in his chapter headings. There were too many unnecessary conversations like what someone fixed for one of the main character’s lunches. The editing was poor with a good number of typos. Events ran into each other so that the reader was confused by being in too many characters heads at the same time. I found myself reading only one or two chapters at a time because of all the uninteresting side stories.

[Mark Gunnell · Rating 2 out of 5]

Where do I start? This book was a complete mess. I would understand if this were the author's first attempt at a novel. While I think the overall concept had some merit (hence the 2 stars)the execution was severely lacking. From the abundance of typos to the awkward dialogue between characters to the jumping back and forth between characters and locations, this book really needs a lot of work.

[Amanda · Rating 2 out of 5]

Interesting storyline, but it read more like someone was telling you the story, rather than allowing the characters to tell the story. Hard to get involved with the characters and at times hard to figure out where the author was going since he started at one point, and then, with no warning, flashback!

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

I almost put this book down because the beginning was so detailed and slow...but I am glad I kept going, as the story moved along much better toward the middle and end. It's the story of a bio terrorism plot in the US and has some interesting subplots going along beside it.

[Kevin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was unexpectedly good. It had a neat storyline and was easy to move through the book. The only problem I had was the story was a little slow to start and the ending was left hanging. Overall a good read.

[Saralyn · Rating 1 out of 5]

I only got a quarter of the way through this book before giving up on it. The writing is bland and clunky, and the story jumps around a lot. Maybe the book gets better, but I really think it should grab my interest before I get halfway through. Not worth my time to finish.

[Jack · Rating 2 out of 5]

Nice idea for a plot, but sadly the prose is clunky and the dialogue stilted. Also it's written from an adolescent perspective, with women portrayed as providers of sex and food.