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Mack Bolan the Executioner #247
Black Dawn Rising
An outbreak of anthrax is unleashed on the U.S., a cult arms for the apocalypse in Senegal, and a nuclear war develops in India. The president dispatches all arms of the Stony Man team to prevent the fall of the West.
224 pages, Paperback
First published June 1, 1999
26 people want to read
About the author
Don Pendleton
1,529 books194 followersDon Pendleton was born in Little Rock, Arkansas, December 12, 1927 and died October 23, 1995 in Arizona.
He wrote mystery, action/adventure, science-fiction, crime fiction, suspense, short stories, nonfiction, and was a comic scriptwriter, poet, screenwriter, essayist, and metaphysical scholar. He published more than 125 books in his long career, and his books have been published in more than 25 foreign languages with close to two hundred million copies in print throughout the world.
After producing a number of science-fiction and mystery novels, Don launched in 1969 the phenomenal Mack Bolan: The Executioner, which quickly emerged as the original, definitive Action/Adventure series. His successful paperback books inspired a new particularly American literary genre during the early 1970's, and Don became known as "the father of action/adventure."
"Although The Executioner Series is far and away my most significant contribution to world literature, I still do not perceive myself as 'belonging' to any particular literary niche. I am simply a storyteller, an entertainer who hopes to enthrall with visions of the reader's own incipient greatness."
Don Pendleton's original Executioner Series are now in ebooks, published by Open Road Media. 37 of the original novels.
Wikipedia: Don Pendleton
He wrote mystery, action/adventure, science-fiction, crime fiction, suspense, short stories, nonfiction, and was a comic scriptwriter, poet, screenwriter, essayist, and metaphysical scholar. He published more than 125 books in his long career, and his books have been published in more than 25 foreign languages with close to two hundred million copies in print throughout the world.
After producing a number of science-fiction and mystery novels, Don launched in 1969 the phenomenal Mack Bolan: The Executioner, which quickly emerged as the original, definitive Action/Adventure series. His successful paperback books inspired a new particularly American literary genre during the early 1970's, and Don became known as "the father of action/adventure."
"Although The Executioner Series is far and away my most significant contribution to world literature, I still do not perceive myself as 'belonging' to any particular literary niche. I am simply a storyteller, an entertainer who hopes to enthrall with visions of the reader's own incipient greatness."
Don Pendleton's original Executioner Series are now in ebooks, published by Open Road Media. 37 of the original novels.
Wikipedia: Don Pendleton
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
August 9, 2019
This was a crazy book to read, to be honest. I was not sure what to expect; a co-worker loaned it to me to read after he saw some of the other books I had recently read and asked if I'd be interesting in trying it out. I said, sure!, and he brought me this and two other books in the series to try out. It starts out 'with a bang' and does not let up for all two hundred or so pages. It is fast paced, and Mack Bolan truly is a 'one-man killing machine.' There is not much character development; I am sure regular readers already know what they need to know about Mack Bolan, and new readers can glean enough about him while reading the book to keep him interesting. I thought there was probably more character development for some of the minor and/or secondary characters. I was surprised at who dies in this book and who lives; based on some early deaths, I figured everybody who was not a 'main character' stood a pretty good chance of dying shortly after their appearance in the book.
This book reminds me of a cross of a Tom Clancy novel (specifically Rainbow Six and an Alistair MacLean novel (maybe When Eight Bells Toll, specifically, but any of his novels involving a single agent trying to save the Free World from a group of criminals or terrorists), except on some form of potent steroids. I will not say the action is 'non-stop', but it is pretty close. The plot is always 'moving forward' and gives the reader momentary breaks to catch their breath before plunging forward again. The deaths in the book are pretty brutal and graphically described; violent deaths are never pretty and should never be pretty. This book makes sure they are not pretty, no matter how clinically they are or are not described.
The ending surprised me, which I was very happy about. The author introduced two minor characters (who turn out to be pretty important by the end of the novel) and I was worried their days were numbered. Considering how many pages were left in the book by the time they were introduced, their days were definitely numbered! It did have some decent plot twists in it; there were some events that happened that I never saw coming and probably never would have seen coming. (Maybe if I had been a regular reader of the series as opposed to dipping into the series 247 novels into the run, I might have seen the twists coming.) Comments are made to other groups and teams that Mack Bolan either works with or has worked with, and I seem to remember seeing novels involving those characters and/or groups, so Mack's "Universe" must have expanded a bit since the first "Mack Bolan" book was published.
I found myself enjoying this book far more than I thought I would. It was a 'fun'-but-brutal read, and, as I said, it reminded me of the Alistair MacLean books I used to read when I was a teenager (only more brutal, more violent, more graphic, and with more bad language). I am glad I was loaned this book to read; I may look into reading more of his exploits (especially the next two, as my co-worker loaned me the next two books in the series as well).
This book reminds me of a cross of a Tom Clancy novel (specifically Rainbow Six and an Alistair MacLean novel (maybe When Eight Bells Toll, specifically, but any of his novels involving a single agent trying to save the Free World from a group of criminals or terrorists), except on some form of potent steroids. I will not say the action is 'non-stop', but it is pretty close. The plot is always 'moving forward' and gives the reader momentary breaks to catch their breath before plunging forward again. The deaths in the book are pretty brutal and graphically described; violent deaths are never pretty and should never be pretty. This book makes sure they are not pretty, no matter how clinically they are or are not described.
The ending surprised me, which I was very happy about. The author introduced two minor characters (who turn out to be pretty important by the end of the novel) and I was worried their days were numbered. Considering how many pages were left in the book by the time they were introduced, their days were definitely numbered! It did have some decent plot twists in it; there were some events that happened that I never saw coming and probably never would have seen coming. (Maybe if I had been a regular reader of the series as opposed to dipping into the series 247 novels into the run, I might have seen the twists coming.) Comments are made to other groups and teams that Mack Bolan either works with or has worked with, and I seem to remember seeing novels involving those characters and/or groups, so Mack's "Universe" must have expanded a bit since the first "Mack Bolan" book was published.
I found myself enjoying this book far more than I thought I would. It was a 'fun'-but-brutal read, and, as I said, it reminded me of the Alistair MacLean books I used to read when I was a teenager (only more brutal, more violent, more graphic, and with more bad language). I am glad I was loaned this book to read; I may look into reading more of his exploits (especially the next two, as my co-worker loaned me the next two books in the series as well).
Displaying 1 of 1 review