The Polaris Protocol

I have been interested in reading a Brad Taylor novel for some time now. I've received tons of recommendations and friends urging me to start his Pike Logan series. After reading <u>Polaris Protocol</u> I can see why it was essential to get my hands on this thrilling series.<br /><br />After being initially being declined by Netgalley to read Polaris Protocol, I was certain my hopes of fulfilling this need to become acquainted with Pike Logan was DOA. With a heavy heart, I reluctantly opened a second email saying my request had been approved. I did a little jig and then sent the copy to my Kindle before the Penguin Group could change their minds. <br /><br /><u>Polaris Protocol</u> begins with some serious GPS failures that appears to be something more than just a software/hardware mating problem. Then military is trying to keep its implications on the hush since losing a drone anywhere in Iran would be catastrophic. Skip to present day where there's more evidence that something's wrong with the North American GPS system. Is it something due to human error that can be resolved or something more sinister at bay?<br /><br />On to Pike Logan and his team. What a bad-a$$! Pike and his team are handling a mission in Turkmenistan when Jennifer receives word from her brother that while on assignment, his life is in jeopardy. Jennifer is frantic and needs to bail on the current mission since she knows that her brothers voice-mail, although brief, means that he is in need of her assistance. Somehow he's gotten his self caught between two opposing Mexican drug cartels while investigating on their turf.<br /><br />Eventually Pike's whole team goes out to save the precious cargo. Jennifer is in trouble and so if he brother. Let the dead bodies begin to pile up!<br /><br /><br />In a nutshell: I loved this book. <u>Polaris Protocol</u> moves at lightening speed, is multi-layered, and easy to follow. Brad Taylor manages to bring every scene to life. Every kick to the throat and punch in the eye was descriptive. I almost felt as if I was reading a movie. Thank you Mr. Taylor. <br /><br />There are bad guys galore so in the beginning, it was a little hard to remember who was a part of what opposing gang. They were both equally menacing. Eventually, those rough patches get smoothed out as the novel progresses. Ultimately, I was just hoping nobody got their hands on the Polaris Protocol program. This program is designed to cripple North America's GPS with no trace. I have only recently become privy to how much we rely on this system. Its timing is embedded in the United States architecture in a way that is scary. Breaking into GPS could cause massive levels of damage to the very things we use daily. Imagine your bank account being wiped out. Yeah! It's like that.<br /><br />The other thing that stood out for me with this novel is that Pike is a well drawn character. With <u>Polaris Protocol</u> being well into an already well established series, its easy for the feature character to get lost in the fray. I didn't feel that this happened at all to Pike. His struggles with managing his team as well keeping his love life with Jennifer balanced was real. It provides a level of depth to a man that seems best at being a bad-a$$. I lack the vocabulary necessary to explain just how cool Pike is and for that I apologize.<br /><br />Ultimately fans of Brad Taylor's won't want to miss <u>Polaris Protocol</u>. If you're a fan of espionage, secret military operations, and just plain ol' bad-a$$ery please check this novel out. This is my first dance with Logan and his special team but it will definitely not be my last.<br /><br /><i>Copy provided by Penguin Group via Netgalley</i><br />

Okay....I went 3 stars on this one and it's a little charitable to that high in some ways.<br /><br />I have liked the Pike Logan books I've read before this and if I go into detail about the problems here it will entail some spoilers. Here I'll simply say that while the books all have a strong strain of fantasy built into the action/geopolitics this steps into a "story place" that I found annoying and would have...frankly...destroyed the team dynamic.<br /><br />In the end the story works out but the plot device and...character interaction puts my continuation of the series in serious doubt. <br /><br />Still has some pretty good action and descent plotting (other than the problematic bit I referred to earlier). You'll probably enjoy the action but if you like some of the more realistic action thrillers this one may seem pretty flawed. It has stepped away from the Pike Logan of the earlier book(s).<br /><br /><input type="checkbox" class="spoiler__control" aria-label="The following text has been marked spoiler. Toggle checkbox to reveal or hide." onchange="this.labels[0].setAttribute('aria-hidden', !this.checked);" id="e636824f-724c-430d-95a3-871f92587d44" /><label aria-hidden="true" class="spoiler" for="e636824f-724c-430d-95a3-871f92587d44"> Okay so what's the big deal? The big deal is Pike sleeping with Jennifer and having to "figure out his feelings" toward her and realize he's been trying to protect her. The big deal is Pike turning to Jennifer and getting her to approve his actions (some team leader). The big deal is that the rest of the team has decided that "it's okay" for two members of the team to be romantically involved.<br /><br />This is an emotional swamp that would destroy any team.The military doesn't even like have siblings posted together or spouses in the same command.<br /><br />What happens when one of these two decides to "give the other the silent treatment" after a disagreement. How much angst will the team survive if one of them decides to protect the other during a fire fight.<br /><br />Combat much less a Spec Ops team is no place for romantic angst. </label>

This was barely okay and never really grabbed me. I might even be generous in giving it two... Taylor has been significantly better before. The story was a little convoluted and unfocused. It just didn’t work for me. The bad guys were boring and Pike and company weren’t much better. It was as if they had regressed all the way back to high school and Taylor thought it was a good story element. Disappointing.

Brad Taylor's Pike Logan anti-terrorist thriller series travels down the well worn "kidnapping plot" line, but Taylor finds a way to make the familiar new by combining it with an interesting take on using technology against the USA. <br /><br />Pike Logan, his girlfriend Jennifer Cahill, Knuckles, Decoy and Blood are all undercover operators for Taskforce, an uber secretive clandestine service used to find terrorists and identify them for a secret USA government counsel, that then decides if the terrorists can be captured or killed. While on a mission, Cahill receives a call from her brother, a reporter, who has been kidnapped by a Mexican drug cartel.<br /><br />Because he is an American, the cartel plans to take him to Mexico and execute him, after learning what he knows about their plan. Their plan, in fact, involves Booth, a traitorous American computer hacker, who has invented the Polaris Protocol, a way to turn off GPS data used by the military and civilian airlines. <br /><br />Cahill rushes to Mexico against Pike's orders and soon finds herself in over her head, but Pike rescues her. Meanwhile, Cahill's brother has been captured by Pelon a murderous assassin and torturer for another Mexican cartel, who are interested in also learning what he knows.<br /><br />Cahill convinces Pike to go after her brother and they soon engage in various battles against Mexican cartel members and find out about the secret GPS disruptive program. It becomes a rush against time to find Cahill before the assassin can find Booth and sell the technology to both the Mexicans and some Arab terrorists. Pike will have to use an old enemy to help with unanticipated results.<br /><br />Taylor knows how to write action sequences and set pieces. The novel moves well and the relationship between Logan and Cahill is still good.<br /><br />Overall this is another excellent thriller with a fast paced plot.

The first half of this book had me thinking this might be my least favorite Pike Logan book. There are story choices in the first half that make it seem like it doesn't even belong in the series. It felt extremely unrealistic (for this series) and sidequesty. Luckily the 2nd half was maybe my favorite so far in terms of tension, stakes, action and plot. I'm still looking for a book in this series that is more even at a high level all the way through.

With this entry in the Pike Logan series, Pike and Jennifer's relationship becomes public knowledge. <br /><br />Jennifer's brother, an unindicted undercover reporter, is captured by a cartel and smuggled into Mexico. The Cartel has plans to interfere with the GPS system for the whole world to facilitate their drug smuggling.<br /><br />Jennifer goes south of the border to rescue him and gets in over her head, so Pike has to rescue her, after which they spend most of the book squabbling. One thing leads to another, and after some brutal killings by an uber assassin, the cartel is trying to sell the GPS process to Hezbollah. Pike lets The Ghost out of prison to go undercover. After a lot of buildup, the confrontation between the elite assassins is anticlimactic.<br /><br />A good novel, but some definite weak spots.

BACK ON TRACK: <br /><br />In the previous book of the Pike Logan series, "The Widow's Strike", I noted that the author, Brad Taylor appeared to be suffering a sophomore slump. For starters, there was only one competent villain in the book and it seemed that The Taskforce was having an easy time instead of working for their paycheck in one of the challenging and horrifying situations they had gone through in the previous books. In "The Polaris Protocol" however, the author has improved on the previous book, crafting the strongest story in the series with major character development, a nail biting plot and a epic threat that in real life, you wouldn't see coming till it's to late. Now to the review,what if the most asymmetric danger to our way of life was already among us.... <br /><br />The novel begins with a brief snapshot of how GPS systems are critical in modern warfare and how the consequences can be catastrophic if they fail. We then cut to Mexico where Jack Cahill, a journalist who has stumbled onto a strange business deal between an American hacktivist and a drug dealer is making a frantic phone call before he's kidnapped by the Sinola Drug Cartel. This phone call reaches Jenifer, his sister in Turkmenistan where she's helping conduct an ongoing surveillance operation aimed at pinpointing an Islamist terrorist. Traveling to Mexico, Jenifer's hunt for her brother ends up dragging Pike Logan and the Taskforce into what starts as a simple kidnap and ransom job but turns into race to stop the destruction of a piece of infrastructure which has become one of the main foundations of modern life in the 21st century. <br /><br />In terms of plot, "The Polaris Protocol" is the best I've seen from the series with the author once again creating some seriously unexpected twists like a surprise guest appearance from one of the previous books. The action is also spot on. From a covert infiltration into a Cartel kidnapping house to a frantic free for all fight in a Mexico City museum, at times, I was left breathless and even wondering at times how Pike Logan would adapt to the increasingly difficult tactical environment. The author also put his research trip in Mexico City to good use, successfully capturing the insane and twisted atmosphere of the Mexican Drug War where acts of horrific violence have become as easy as flicking off a light switch. This is the most brutal book in the series and I advise first time readers to go back to the other books before reading this one. <br /><br />In terms of character interaction and development, this book trumps its predecessor in so many ways. Firstly, Pike and Jennifer are now having to learn to deal with the struggles of their relationship, with Pike trying to reign in his natural protectiveness of Jenifer to prevent it from getting in the way of their job while Jenifer is forced to make tough calls in her personal and professional worlds when they come together with near disastrous results for her and the Taskforce. The book also focuses on how she's the moral compass and sometimes brains of Pike's team, making a critical spot check which saves the day at the eleventh hour. Secondly,Pike and Jennifer's team gets a major dose of character development when they begin to show a lot more appreciation for Jennifer in subtle ways, even sticking their necks out for her at a critical moment in the story when all appear to be lost. Thirdly, we have Mr Sicario and "Gamal Hussein", the two main antagonists of the book who offer an interesting philosophical perspective about killing. The Sicario, while ruthless has a nagging doubt in the back of his head about the justifications he uses for his actions and is constantly trying to find someone to challenge them while "Gamal Hussein" has a streak on honor in him but is an unapologetic killer to the core. What I've always loved about Brad Taylor's villains is that they've got shades of gray along within the blackness of their morality making them much more interesting and far more dangerous than other villains in the genre. Finally, there's Arthur Booth, the American Hacktivist/Contractor/Traitor who kicks off the events of the book. Cowardly, egotistical and utterly opportunistic, even the unstable Sicario is a much more worthy opponent than Mr Booth who dissolves into a blubbering mess when the universe decides to drown him in a tsunami of bad luck and trouble. But the thing that damns him the most is that unlike the Taskforce, he never stops to consider the consequences of his actions, which is fully demonstrated when he murders a planeload of people with the software he plans to sell to a hostile third party. <br /><br />But the star of the show is the main "epic threat" of the novel, the compromising of the GPS constellation. The author has put his studies in asymmetric warfare to good use, creating a unique and terrifying threat which would be damn near impossible to counter in time. From transport to financial services, GPS is critical in many things which we take for granted and in the story, Brad Taylor creates a scenario where the titular Polaris protocol, a fictional computer software, exists to screw up the GPS networks timing signals along with everything that is connected to it. From planes falling out of the sky to economic collapse due to financial transactions not knowing where to go, this threat is far more interesting than your usual assassination of stop the bomb plot. On a related note, recently, the university of Texas conducted an experiment with GPS spoofing, using a powerful transmitter to deceive the navigation systems of a yacht and successfully make it go off course by sending false coordinates making the threat of this story just that more plausible and worrying. <br /><br />Minor criticism, there was a moment in the book involving a certain type of restraint where Pike should have known better and dropped the ball, causing a complication which normally he would have seen coming. Apart from that, the story was fantastic. <br /><br />Overall, the author has rebounded strongly from the sophomore slump from the previous book. From addressing issues such as contractors, the difference between whistle blowers and traitors, the Mexican drug war and the importance of a infrastructure system we take for granted, Brad Taylor has matured as a thriller writer and in my opinion, has clawed his way up to the top of the Military thriller genre with the best installment in the Pike Logan series to date. <br />COMPLETELY RECOMMENDED.

The Polaris Protocol is a thrilling read with a healthy diet of action, thrills, romance and wonderful evolution of characters that readers have come to love in the Pike Logan series. The thrilling narrative of an attack on Global Positioning System that can prove to be catastrophic since almost every major aspect of infrastructure now depends on GPS. Mr. Taylor presents a scary scenario of this aspect and infuses realistic action and storytelling into the narrative that kept me glued to the book. Pike Logan keeps evolving with a finesse that is due to Mr. Taylor's exquisite writing. I personally enjoyed reading Pike's and Jennifer's chemistry that does not take after a cliche but rather presents an understanding feel to their relationship that made me root for them even more. The entire Taskforce members create an amazing team atmosphere that keeps the conversations and witty banters all the more fun to read. While I prefer the action to be more weapon-detail oriented, the action in this novel still holds up very well. The novel makes references to prior adventures of the Taskforce which makes it all the more interesting for the readers of the series. While this novel appeals to the fans of Pike Logan, new readers of the series can jump into the novel easily as well. <br /><br />All in all, The Polaris Protocol is a stunning and grounded thriller that does not disappoint.

Love this installment of the adventures of Pike and Jennifer. The tension is really high in this one. Taylor also does an excellent job of further developing the character of Pike and Jennifer while bringing back a character from my {so far} favorite of the series Enemy of Mine. It's a windy, twisty, turvy plot that you wonder how he's going to get from beginning to end, but it all comes together with a big bang (literally) and a very satisfactory ending.<br /><br />Highly recommend this series for fans of Vince Flynn, Ben Coes, Brad Thor.

Another action story by the extremely knowledgeable and talented Brad Taylor. This could easily be 5 stars, but I nit-pick at the almost juvenile relationship between jealous Pike and Jennifer. Less of that makes this novel more focused and rewarding. In addition, the ending could have been embellished more around the consequences of the final actions taken. 8 of 10 stars