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Authors laboring in the thriller genre have produced an embarrassment of riches lately, with worthwhile books being published on what seems to be a daily basis. PRIVATE WARS by Greg Rucka is this week's entry. Rucka has established his considerable bona fides in a number of media recently, primarily in the comic or sequential art fields. He currently is authoring acclaimed story arcs in WONDER WOMAN and THE ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN, as well as a limited series entitled THE OMAC PROJECT. Rucka also has his own ongoing graphic novel series QUEEN AND COUNTRY, where the characters in PRIVATE WARS and 2004's A GENTLEMAN'S GAME come from. While QUEEN AND COUNTRY is a favorite around Casa de Hartlaub, it is in the thrillers where Rucka's talent truly shines.
PRIVATE WARS picks up almost immediately where A GENTLEMAN'S GAME left off. Tara Chace, Minder One of Her Majesty's Secret Intelligence Service, is still reeling from the events that took place at the close of A GENTLEMAN'S GAME. Chace abruptly quits the Service after being denied a leave of absence from her post, an occurrence that almost immediately leaves her agency in the lurch when a power struggle in Uzbekistan results in a strategic crisis involving Britain and the United States. Chace is persuaded to return to service in order to extricate the pro-Western heir to power before he is assassinated.
As anyone familiar with A GENTLEMAN'S GAME might expect, there are any number of red herrings, wild cards and duplicitous settings where friend and foe change sides and identities --- if they can be identified at all. Chace has more than her own self-preservation guiding her motives, and to complicate matters her mission constantly…changes. Rucka's ability to keep things racing along while explaining and exploring the subtleties of this complex plot is almost unbelievable. Additionally, about midway through the novel, there is an occurrence that is as suspenseful and exciting as anything I have read or watched this year. Seriously. I can't give any work a higher recommendation than that.
Rucka is at the top of his game, and PRIVATE WARS is the pinnacle of his work to date. This is a thriller not to be missed.
--- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub
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