this is the 250th book I've read this year.

if you like thrillers, you should really give these Eisler books a try.

It was an average book, to be honest. Simple & one plot, not deviating into any side plots, start and end as a quick short read. Nothing stands out in the book, nothing lingers in your mind as an afterthought or picks on your brain, a straight read from start to the end.

John Rain has been living in Rio in hiding from his past involving CIA, Japan & Midori, created a separate identity for himself and manages to live below the radar. But when he gets in touch with his old gf in Rio, CIA finds him and offers him a job as an independent consultant which he cannot refuse. The job is to kill a Belghazi, an Algerian-French arms dealer trafficking in illegal delivery of arms to the sensitive middle eastern countries. Rain arrives in Hong Kong where Belghazi is on a business (meeting clients) and pleasure (gambling in Macau casinos). Belghazi has a beautiful blonde companion with him, Delilah, who is a Mossad agent in reality. Rain’s plan to kill Belghazi is put on temporary hold by Delilah as she need certain information from Belghazi’s computer for an arms deal to happen in the next few days before which Delilah cannot allow Rain to kill him. Both reluctantly accept the truce, not before Delilah and Rain falling for a quick steamy one night stand.

But before Rain could wait out those few days for Delilah to extract the required information, Rain gets identified by Belghazi and attempts to Rain’s life happens via some Arab mercenaries. Rain pumps his handlers in CIA to get more information on his life attempt and finds that Belghazi receives protection from some department in CIA as he passes info on bigger (WMD-type) arms deals to CIA, if they are planned to happen against the US. Rain takes it on himself to remove the other party who passed information on Rain to Belghazi, then teams up with Dox, an unlikely ally from Rain’s Afghanistan days in the US Army and then plans to kill Belghazi in an elaborate ops.
The final showdown at Kwai Chung is quite interesting, Rain manages to kill Belghazi but not before he is seriously injured and rescued by Dox from the crime & shootout scene. The plan of taking the 5M USD as part of the weapons exchange deal goes bad as the American NOC in Hong Kong, who was helping Belghazi in overseeing the deal, steals it by killing the rest of the parties (Arabs) involved. But Rain survives the day only to fight another day.

The book ends with a soft touch where Delilah unites with Rain in Rio beach and they spend some relaxed time together. And Delilah reveals that she meets up with Rain not just for emotional reasons, but also for professional as she has a job offer for Rain. But that is for another novel which Eisler would take Rain’s journey forward.
Quick read, something which keep you glued to the pages though not a strong plot to rivet your interest (infact I struggled at one point to continue with the book till the end), but good enough for a quick read and forget it.

Gostei do livro.
As descrições dos cenários levam o leitor a acreditar ter estado mesmo lá; o personagem principal, por mais cruel, insensível e solitário que seja, obriga-nos a adorá-lo; o enredo é interessante, se bem que se pudesse ter revelado mais surpreendente. Esperava uma reviravolta mais emocionante no final; esperava uma personagem mais forte e traiçoeira no que toca à Delilah – a espiã israelita com que John se depara no decorrer da sua missão. Foi bom, só não achei suficiente – podia ter sido bastante melhor. A organização do texto podia, também, ter sido feita de outra maneira: capítulos mais curtos teriam tornado a leitura menos cansativa.

Rain Storm, or Winner Takes All as it is called on GR, could be described as "How to be an Assassin for Dummies". Every action, whether it's a counter surveillance move or a chop to the solar plexus, is explained in detail. Each fight is literally a blow-by-blow account, sometimes with a pause to give a particular move a name and its history. There is no show without a tell in case the reader missed it. However, most reviewers don't seem to be bothered by this and it's still a fun action thriller that's enjoyable enough as long as it isn't taken seriously. My audio edition appeared to be narrated by Principal Skinner from The Simpsons and was a bit droll for this kind of novel, but at least he spoke clearly. An average rating that I've generously rounded up to 3 stars.

Six-word Review: Action-filled with some unbelievable sections.

Longer review later.

A CIA contact killer who specializes in making it look like natural causes (and happens to be Caucasian/Japanese) is on the hunt in Macau. Someone else is after the mark and they work together. There are connections with the CIA and the Japanese Yakuza.

It’s hard to characterize this writing style of the ‘action’ genera. Nevertheless, I find it interesting. There are very detailed explanations of hand-to-hand fighting. The author writes in a way that is always very 'calm’ – in a Zen kind-of way. It’s very precise ... thinking chess-moves ahead. (The author seems to have an extensive knowledge – in minute detail – of the martial arts. There are moment-by-moment details/explanations, even naming the moves.) The style works well getting into the mind of the hit man/assassin.

I think that you would have to have read some of the prior novels in the series to fully appreciate this book. That being said, I have already bought the next one on the series.

It is hard to fully embrace somebody who is a killer. Somebody who can snap necks is a bit gruesome. He certainly not somebody you'd want as a friend :-) yet you do kind of root for him. Sadly not all of the people he kills are outright bad guys. Some are perhaps just doing their job, some are maybe just more hired. Thugs, but I don't think that means you deserve to die. But another good story in this series

Having started at the wrong end of the series, it took me a while to be willing to go back to the beginning and start with book 1, mostly because I loved the group of characters and wasn't sure I'd enjoy the books that were mostly about just one or two. I was eagerly awaiting the introduction of some of the characters I knew from later books. However, I really enjoyed John Rain on his own, making his own decisions and in full control of his own life without consideration for most other people. This book is the first one that introduces characters beyond John Rain himself that I know will be sticking around. (Actually, that's not true. The second book introduced Kanezecki, but I wasn't really counting him.) It was fun to watch them come onstage and experience them through John's eyes and learn a bit more about them than I maybe knew from the later novels in the series.

It is interesting watching John transform. I think he knows he needs to make changes and isn't sure how to make them; especially in ways that won't have lethal reprecussions for him down the road. I'm not sad for John to see the relationships I know are coming start to form. But I do think I have a bettet understanding now of why John so completely retreats from those same relationships periodically in the future books. With every gain (and it's human to need social connections and physical contact) there is a loss (John actually lived very well for a very long time with minimal connection and found alternate ways to cope and thrive - killing aside).

I reviewed the first book in this series saying I couldn't live the way John lives. This is still true. And it's still ridiculous that I can completely separate what he does for a living from my consideration of his lifestyle. The most basic reason I couldn't live the way he lives is I couldn't kill people for a living. But I set all that aside and considered the rest of his life. Because in the first book he seems to have lots of money and lots of free time. That hasn't really changed in this book, I suppose, except it's set up early on that the money is running thin. That's part of why he's agreed to the job he's doing. Only he spends a LOT of money during this story. I wasn't adding it up, and I know some of what he spends is reimbursable expenses, but it kind of seemed to me that he really wasn't going to end up making a lot of money on the job when all was said and done.

Spoilers -

And then he gave away everything he did earn. Generous. A nice indicator of the new trust he's got in his relationship with Dox. But I kept thinking, "wait - didn't you say you needed this money?!?"

It was hard to read that last fight. After two books of being nervous for John in multiple fight scenarios only to have him pull free; and knowing he's still a force to be reckoned with however many books past this one; I was more relaxed going into the final climactic encounter in this novel. And it turns out I shouldn't have been. It really allows for the trust to be established between John and Dox. To have that much at stake and Dox behave as he does is huge. So, I do think part of it was about character and relationship development. But I also think I shouldn't have been relaxed. On any given day anyone might win or lose a fight. Still, it's hard to watch your hero (John Rain is a very unlikely hero at this point in the series!) go down. Especially to someone who is in no way a hero.

Working freelance for the CIA, John Rain is targeting an arms dealer in Southeast Asia when he finds himself to be the target.

Back to his meticulous cold-blooded killings just like Book #1, John Rain is a man who trusts no one. Luckily, we are introduced to former Army associate and expert sniper Dox, here to save the day and break the tension just as he does in the Livia Lone series.

Slow moving in the middle of the book, but a dramatic ending.

I like John Rain. I like the action. His enemies are interesting. His allies are too. I like the women in his life and how those relationships offer a different view of him and his work.

What I don't like is how complicated his plots can be - or at least how complicated Eisler wants us to think they are. Solving the double-cross, triple-cross, quadruple-cross, etc., is more exasperating than fun. It feels more like an Eisler conceit than a required plot element.

I'm going to read installment No. 4. And I am going to hope for more of Rain, of action, enemies and girlfriends and for fewer mindbenders. That might be where a decision on No. 5 (is there a No. 5?) turns.

HH

I feel like this one really went downhill compared to the two previous books. I appreciated the change of location but in retrospect, I might have appreciated more of the same. This book seemed a lot more like John Rain was channeling the author's political opinions, which felt wrong. I plan to read the sequel since I have the physical book, but I don't know if it's worth continuing beyond that. Also, the ending was somewhat confusing and seemed like a cop-out.

Another exciting John Rain novel where the CIA found him in Brazil and hires him to assassinate an arms dealer. His first attempt is spoiled by a Mossad agent who request he wait a little bit. As time is going by a couple of hit teams come after him, and even part of the CIA are trying to stop him. The finish is an old fashioned shoot out where John needed someone's help. Great reading and plenty of action thanks