Often coming off like a combination of Tom Clancy and Michael Crichton because of his ease with military-oriented storylines and facility for pacing, Minneapolis writer Vince Flynn (“The Third Option,” “Consent to Kill”) cobbles together the sort of thrillers that are the literary equivalent of potato chips: They may not be good for you and might cause indigestion, but you just can’t seem to stop munching.
Flynn’s protagonist is Mitch Rapp, the 21st century’s answer to Jack Ryan, a one- man Special Forces team who eats bad guys for breakfast. Eschewing his usual terrorist plot elements in “Act of Treason,” Flynn presents his fans with a politically charged thriller that hits the stands just in time for real-life congressional elections and sometimes reads like “The Osterman Weekend” meets “The Beltway Boys.”
When a Democratic president announces that he has Parkinson’s disease and will not run for re-election, his vice president, Sherman Baxter III, begins to worry about his chances for carrying the banner, especially since he’s doing poorly in the polls. Meanwhile, his director of National Intelligence, Mark Ross, decides to join the ticket of a governor from Georgia, Josh Alexander, whose wife, Jillian, is “gorgeous, classy and hot, all at the same time.”
All three are in a motorcade that is guarded, in part, by Secret Service Agent Maria Rivera, a friend of Mitch Rapp, Washington’s go-to guy when something illegal but necessary needs to be done. So when the motorcade is attacked, resulting in the deaths of Jillian and several Secret Service agents, Rapp is called in.
Two weeks after the bombing, Josh Alexander and Ross win by a landslide. And as the investigation moves forward, someone discovers that Jillian was having an affair with Matt Cash, a Secret Service agent. Furthermore, both Cash and Alexander were riding in the same limo.
The best part of “Act of Treason” is Flynn’s look at how things operate in the intelligence departments of D.C. Unfortunately, his take on the men doing this work is much like many 1950s movies: All the guys in the intelligence department seem to be wearing white hats. While this works like gangbusters when he’s tackling the subject of terrorism, it only serves to underscore the improbability of the theories about the crime put forth by the CIA.
So when pit bull/hero Rapp is cut loose, his illegal and semi-psychotic actions are that much more pronounced. And the shaky premise makes the ending seem improbable as well. Even though “Act of Treason” starts out fast and strong, many readers may find themselves losing that all-important suspension of disbelief halfway through, which could spell disaster for Flynn and his record on bestseller lists.
Then again, given the public’s willingness to believe just about anything coming out of the Beltway these days, don’t bet against a No. 1 showing for “Act of Treason.”
Dorman T. Shindler is a freelance writer from Kansas City.
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Act of Treason
By Vince Flynn
Atria, 416 pages, $25.95
