DAVID STONE – The Orpheus Deception. Jove, paperback reprint; 1st printing, April 2009. G. P. Putnam’s Sons, hardcover, March 2008.

DAVID STONE

   This book begins, so far as I can tell, exactly where the previous book in the series leaves off. That book would be The Echelon Vendetta, the first Micah Dalton adventure (which I have not read), and David Stone’s first book. Here’s some information about him, taken directly from his website:

    “DAVID STONE is a cover name for a man born into a military family with a history of combat service going backtoWaterloo.STONE, a military officer himself, has worked with federal intelligence agencies and state-level law enforcement units in North America, Central America, and South East Asia. Retired now, STONE lives in an undisclosed location with his wife, photographer and researcher Catherine Stone.”

   As for Micah Dalton, a covert CIA operative – sort of a “cleaner,” if you will – is now on the outs with his superiors, but in this second book – a long, over-sized 532 page novel – he quickly finds himself quickly enough back in the game, something to do with a pirated oil tanker in the South China Sea, a microbiological lab, nerve gas (or something similar), and without going into details, it’s one heck of a ride and one that’s surprisingly easy to read.

   To explain. Stone’s bold, picturesque style of writing, plus more than a dollop of humor, makes up for the fact that for well over 100 pages the story line in the first book is still being rehashed, with characters still being introduced from that book, and all it takes for a new reader to get into the swing of things. (Me!)

   But readers can’t be held responsible for remembering all of the details of all of the books they’ve read, and unless they read them in order, one after the other, I fear they’re up the same river in the same canoe and without the same paddle as I. But around page 118 – I just went back and looked – the story really begins, and from that point on, it’s in high gear all the way.

   To give you a taste of the souffle – that is to say Stone’s descriptive ability and general overall point of view, though he will surprise you on the latter, or at least several times he did me – here’s a long quote from the beginning of Chapter 13, or for the more precision-minded among us, page 172:

DAVID STONE

    Singapore – in particular, the city itself – is a lunatic blend of Mao Tse-tung and Dale Carnegie; a broad, steaming sandbar, as flat as a sewage spill, on which the tyrannical, puritanical government of Lee Kwan Yew, known inside the Agency as “Uncle Harry,” has brought forth by sheer force of totalitarian will a postmodern powerhouse of shimmering economic cathedrals and, towering spires. These pinnacles rise up out of a hundred little cantonments, teeming with millions upon millions of buzzing little worker bees, all maniacally dedicated to the three First Principles that have always guided the Asiatic mind: never look a cop in the eye; if it slithers you should eat it; and money is the root of all evil only if you don’t have any.

    The brand-new airport at Changi was conceived as a top-of-the-lungs statement about the New Singapore – acres of gleaming glass and marble, concourses large enough to house the Super Bowl, lounges and bars and shops to rival Rodeo Drive, and enough squinty -eyed, flat-faced, cold-assed little soldier-bots slinging MP5s scattered about the premises to keep Al Gore away from a ham sandwich.

    The Terminal 2 concourse was crowded with European and North American backpackers, wearing the trademark uniform of backpackers everywhere: baggy camo shorts; lots of metal bits, sticking out of their lips and eyebrows and noses and chins; butt-stupid, self-inflicted body hair; tattoos; complicated rubber sandals as ugly as cow flaps; and, of course, the inevitable dung-colored hemp T-shirt carrying some vapid political piety — ANSWER (Act Now to Stop War and End Racism), TREES ARE NOT TERRORISTS, FREE TIBET, and Dalton’s favorite, for sheer moronic redundancy, WARS KILL PEOPLE AND OTHER LIVING THINGS.

   Besides the descriptions and the point of views and the dollop of humor, there is just enough violence to keep the less-jaded thriller fans happy, and an ending that even improves on James Bond films, if that could be so, and you’ll have to read the book yourself to tell me if I’m right or not.