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Agent Micah Dalton #2
The Orpheus Deception
Covert operative Micah Dalton is on the outs with his former bosses, staying off the radar and hopefully out of firing range—until an attempt on his life forces him back to the CIA, where he must find an old associate who’s gone missing.
But Micah’s mission is not about a man. It’s about an elusive ship that is already heading west. And its cargo is death.
But Micah’s mission is not about a man. It’s about an elusive ship that is already heading west. And its cargo is death.
544 pages, Paperback
First published March 27, 2008
12 people are currently reading
340 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 39 reviews
September 20, 2022
4,25 sterren- Nederlandse paperback
Recensie volgt later.
Recensie volgt later.
July 14, 2019
Micah Dalton was walking in Venice when he was stabbed by an unlikely assassin. He nearly lost his life but was saved by Cora Vasari in the Nick of time. Elsewhere, Ray Fyke on a tanker narrowly escaped a pirate attempt at the Malacca Straits. Bravo Gospic is at the center of this pirate incident as with the Venice incident. Dalton was once again called upon by Langley to do their bidding to rescued Ray from Changi Prison before he revealed any secret. From there it is onto the Celebes sea to find for the missing tanker Mingo Dubai. Something is not right and it all ends in a dramatic endgame in Lake Chicago.
August 2, 2020
A beach read that I found in our B&B. Quick read, but I enjoyed the pace that stretched from Venice to the South China Sea, Serbia, DC, Bangkok, and the Port of Chicago. It kept me involved. Micah Dalton is an interesting character.
June 17, 2017
Decent enough spy thriller. Not as good as the older Ludlum novels (Matarese Circle). Very fast-paced with a somewhat disappointing twist at the end.
April 6, 2018
not to my liking
December 10, 2018
Micah didnt disappoint, the addition of the British woman added flavor as well!
July 30, 2019
Lots of mayhem and macho head games. Good story that extends across continents and subcontinents.
November 4, 2019
Was looking forward to a good spy thriller but couldn’t get past all the “carnal” looks everyone was having for each other and the objectification of every female character.
July 26, 2022
DNF Picked this up at a neighborhood free library.
Confusing charters and too much overt violence for me.
The main character was interesting but that's all the good I have to offer.
Confusing charters and too much overt violence for me.
The main character was interesting but that's all the good I have to offer.
September 3, 2022
Not nearly as enjoyable as the first Dalton book. Authors politics showed often in the dialog. Many passages of description were so dense as to be confusing.,
May 20, 2024
A great second part of the series. Characters and the plot remain true to the first book.
April 3, 2009
Borrowed this book from an officemate who said I have to return it Friday, because somebody is going to pick it up from him Saturday. So I read it in one lunch break and overnight.
This is the second book in the Micah Dalton series, sequel to The Echelon Vendetta. In the first book, David Stone, a pen name used by a former intelligence officer, introduced Micah Dalton, a CIA cleaner, but his job does not involve the use of a broom and mop. Book summary and other reviews have cleaner in quotation marks - I decided to break with tradition and leave them out.
In The Echelon Vendetta, Porter Nauman, Micah's friend and mentor, was brutally murdered. When Micah started to investigate, Porter's whole family suffered a gruesome death also. Afterward, Micah started seeing Porter's ghost and even converse with him like a real person. In this book, Porter's ghost ever warns Micah of some dangers ahead although it is too late to affect the outcome.
Having offended his superiors by his actions in the previous book, Micah is trying to get back into their good graces. He is ordered to work with a British agent, Mandy Pawnall, to search and rescue Ray Fyke, missing SAS soldier who was believed to be imprisoned in an Asian jail. Other side events in the book are the hijacking of a ship, Orpheus, in the South China sea; a pending biological attack in Chicago; a vendetta being perpetrated by a Balkan warlord/gangster against Micah. As in the first book, action and excitement is breathtaking and non-stop, which leaves the conclusion a very disappointing one.
I'm hoping the third book, The Venetian Judgment, being released this month, can restore the excitement of the series. Micah Dalton is at the crossroads of his life: should he leave his past behind to be with Cora Vasari, the beautiful Italian lady he met in the first book and seriously injured in this volume, or continue his life and expose her to more dangers ahead?
3.5 star rating.
This is the second book in the Micah Dalton series, sequel to The Echelon Vendetta. In the first book, David Stone, a pen name used by a former intelligence officer, introduced Micah Dalton, a CIA cleaner, but his job does not involve the use of a broom and mop. Book summary and other reviews have cleaner in quotation marks - I decided to break with tradition and leave them out.
In The Echelon Vendetta, Porter Nauman, Micah's friend and mentor, was brutally murdered. When Micah started to investigate, Porter's whole family suffered a gruesome death also. Afterward, Micah started seeing Porter's ghost and even converse with him like a real person. In this book, Porter's ghost ever warns Micah of some dangers ahead although it is too late to affect the outcome.
Having offended his superiors by his actions in the previous book, Micah is trying to get back into their good graces. He is ordered to work with a British agent, Mandy Pawnall, to search and rescue Ray Fyke, missing SAS soldier who was believed to be imprisoned in an Asian jail. Other side events in the book are the hijacking of a ship, Orpheus, in the South China sea; a pending biological attack in Chicago; a vendetta being perpetrated by a Balkan warlord/gangster against Micah. As in the first book, action and excitement is breathtaking and non-stop, which leaves the conclusion a very disappointing one.
I'm hoping the third book, The Venetian Judgment, being released this month, can restore the excitement of the series. Micah Dalton is at the crossroads of his life: should he leave his past behind to be with Cora Vasari, the beautiful Italian lady he met in the first book and seriously injured in this volume, or continue his life and expose her to more dangers ahead?
3.5 star rating.
September 2, 2009
A unique read in the espionage genre. The author interweaves the paranormal so well into the main character that sometimes you are unclear where reality ends and the supernatural begins. It is a fresh look at your typical spy novel. I really liked his cynical take on modern pop culture: the indictment of style vis-a-vis his description of young American and European tourists on page 173 had me laughing shamelessly. He also paints the current Asian cultural revolution in less than flattering but honest tones. The plot is interesting, but rather incredulous, and one thread all but comes unraveled at the end. I think it is an enjoyable read - compelling from many perspectives, but the reader is more likely to remember it for its parts rather than the whole.
April 1, 2015
My wife and I grew up in the Calumet region of extreme North West Indiana so it was interesting that the spectacular events of this novel culminate in that area near Chicago.
We had training during our cruise that passed near Somalia so it was amazing to read about the way the crew of the refurbished tanker handled a pirate attack near the end of the novel. That tanker had survived a pirate attack at the beginning of this novel and the events imagined take the reader from such as Florence, Venice, Singapore, Malaysia, Polynesia and various locations, many of which we have had the enjoyment of visiting during our many cruises.
I had been unaware of the enjoyable adventures that this author has produced and I anticipate reading many more!
We had training during our cruise that passed near Somalia so it was amazing to read about the way the crew of the refurbished tanker handled a pirate attack near the end of the novel. That tanker had survived a pirate attack at the beginning of this novel and the events imagined take the reader from such as Florence, Venice, Singapore, Malaysia, Polynesia and various locations, many of which we have had the enjoyment of visiting during our many cruises.
I had been unaware of the enjoyable adventures that this author has produced and I anticipate reading many more!
February 27, 2019
My wife and I grew up in the Calumet region of extreme North West Indiana so it was interesting that the spectacular events of this novel culminate in that area near Chicago.
We had training during our cruise that passed near Somalia so it was amazing to read about the way the crew of the refurbished tanker handled a pirate attack near the end of the novel. That tanker had survived a pirate attack at the beginning of this novel and the events imagined take the reader from such as Florence, Venice, Singapore, Malaysia, Polynesia and various locations, many of which we have had the enjoyment of visiting during our many cruises.
I had been unaware of the enjoyable adventures that this author has produced and I anticipate reading many more!
We had training during our cruise that passed near Somalia so it was amazing to read about the way the crew of the refurbished tanker handled a pirate attack near the end of the novel. That tanker had survived a pirate attack at the beginning of this novel and the events imagined take the reader from such as Florence, Venice, Singapore, Malaysia, Polynesia and various locations, many of which we have had the enjoyment of visiting during our many cruises.
I had been unaware of the enjoyable adventures that this author has produced and I anticipate reading many more!
December 10, 2008
A surprisingly enjoyable read. I thought it was going to be another yawn inducing "thriller" with single-page "chapters" but it turned out to be very engaging. The interesting thing is the author is using the name "David Stone" as a cover - he is apparently some kind of enchilada in the intelligence community and doesn't want to reveal himself. (No picture of him obviously.) But his writing does ring true, and his language is ... dashing. He could be British or have some British connection - I can't imagine an American writer saying things like "deader than di and dodi". Unputdownable, really.
February 18, 2011
Okay; I'm claiming credit for books 2,3,and 4. Couldn't find the first in this series of Micah Dalton in the library. Great read; very real in terms of operational stuff. Good tactics, techniques and a realistic look in the covert shadow wars that are often played in the back alleys of the world.
Semi-serious as you can definitely see/recognize some of the political characters.
But this book is mostly for action junkies, who enjoy fairly complicated espionage plots.
Plus there are bonus references to Le Carre and Fleming. If you don't know who I mean, forget about it.
Semi-serious as you can definitely see/recognize some of the political characters.
But this book is mostly for action junkies, who enjoy fairly complicated espionage plots.
Plus there are bonus references to Le Carre and Fleming. If you don't know who I mean, forget about it.
October 26, 2012
I was excited to read this after Stone’s first book about CIA cleaner Micah Dalton. But there was less of Dalton in this book, and it had many preposterous plots. There were really no mysteries. I guess there was a mystery of how to tie evidence of a terrorist attaches to the port of a Chicago to a Serbian mafia guy, but we knew from the beginning did this. There are a couple of sociopaths that we have to spend a lot of time with, and many gruesome deaths, and time in Singapore, DC and Venice. There are too many characters, and not enough of Micah or the Italian cop, Brancati.
September 3, 2013
Love this series by David Stone. Action, mystery, plenty of plot twists, very likable characters and enough diabolical villains to keep you gripped with suspense. The stories take place in some of the most exotic places in the world. Since I have been to many of those places, I can tell that the author has been there as well by his descriptions. I would recommend this series to anyone who loves books that are impossible to put down and walk away from.
June 2, 2008
This was a decent book. The author took a a few to many cheap shots at the Clinton administration and the left in general for my taste. It is fiction after all. If you can ignore that it was not bad and better than most international spy thrillers.
February 24, 2010
Still great dry lines in dialogue and descriptions, but the story line is more fractured than the first one, which weakens this book. Porter Naumann's ghost figures less in this one, too, which is too bad. I can't think of a thriller with a paranormal element -- although they're probably out there.
December 14, 2010
Follows up the Echelon Vendetta. With Micah Dalton CIA fixer fleeing for his life.
He goes to Singapore to help free Ray Fike from prison and to solve the mystery of the missing tanker (taken by Serbs).
He goes to Singapore to help free Ray Fike from prison and to solve the mystery of the missing tanker (taken by Serbs).
August 7, 2023
Looked forward to it, as follow-up to Echelon Vendetta. Starts adding interesting details and opinions about US counterintelligence. & different Presidential administrations, but generally praises Repulbicans and trashes Democrats. Once again, easy to read, lots of action and subplots.
Read
February 5, 2012Tried to read it; didn't get far enough to feel I should even rate it. But I can't seem to get past the lengthy debates that Dalton has with his dead partner. Interesting spy craft. Very twisty. Will keep trying more of David Stone.
November 25, 2014
Pretty decent story with good pacing. The structural elements seem a bit week and unrealistic, would the CIA or NSA really operate in this manner? Putting that aside this is a fun audio book to listen to with a mediocre ending.
July 30, 2016
It was a real struggle to get through to the end. Nothing happens for the first 500 pages and then all the exciting and action packed bits are squeezed into the last 30 pages. I only finished this book because I started reading it.
March 23, 2009
Thriller. I listened to the audio and really enjoyed.
April 14, 2010
The Orpheus Deception is the first novel I've read from David Stone. Unfortunately, I found this story too long winded and it took forever to grab my attention and keep it.
May 31, 2010
This book has a different twist on the save the world hero. To really enjoy this book, would suggest you read the first book The Echelon Vendetta.
June 17, 2011
Love David Stone's writing. Good plot and characters are well developed.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 39 reviews