Powerade Drinkers Beware

When I was a little girl I loved playing “cops and robbers” with my older brother. He, being the complete deviant that he was, took pleasure plotting these massive jewel heist from inside his tree house, and I, the incredibly obnoxious “goodie two shoes” loved taking him down. (Freeze Dirtbag! You are under arrest!) Now, things have changed over the years, my brother has moved away (thank God because he is still a deviant) and I have formed a rather frigged opinion of guns, but one thing will always remain the same; there are few things more thrilling than saving the day.

Why am I telling you all of this? Well, duh, I like to hear myself talk (just kidding.) No, the reason I decided to mention just one more mildly embarrassing childhood memory is because “Model Agent” by Sean Sweeney dredged up those long lost desires to become Laura Croft, or at the very least, sport some killer blue skin and call myself Mystique. In short…be the girl superhero that everyone needs, but no one expects.

Jaclyn Johnson is what most women aspire to be; beautiful, smart and confident. She can also kill you with her pinkie. Since the tragic death of her parents Jaclyn has been adopted and trained by the government to do one thing, take out terrorist, but she never expected the terrorist to be one of America’s elite. Could people really be dropping dead from drinking water? That’s exactly what Jaclyn is sent to find out, unfortunately she doesn’t get very far before tragedy strikes her in an entirely different manor and leaves her with a score to settle. Armed with enough goodies to make Bond jealous, Jaclyn does what she does best; sets out to fix the problem, but will she be able to put her personal vendetta aside long enough find the person responsible for bringing Boston to its knees, or will she fail, and take with her the health of an entire nation?

There is no point in denying my hesitance to write this review. See… Sean Sweeney and I are friends, not “Hey let’s go grab lunch” type friends, but we do talk on a daily basis. We have inside jokes, have no problem telling each other that we wish the other would fall off of a cliff, and take pride in our ability to call each other out on our bullshit. For ME reading a book by Sean is different than reading a book by an author I have never talked to. Why? Because it becomes much more difficult to separate the man I KNOW from the author he IS. That being said, I assure I will try my best to be objective in my review (and as a result may judge him more harshly that I would others… tuff love if you will.)

First let me talk about the things that impressed me.

The story. While Sweeney could have very easily dug his own grave by choosing to multi-narrate his novel, the result was actually quite refreshing. More often than not thrillers have us seeking the answers right along with the lead character, however, in a moment of writing genius (I’m sure,) Sweeney decided to follow the killer, as well as the other acting parties. Allowing his reader to view the story from EVERY angle only enhanced a plot line that could have otherwise been very straight and formulatic. (hmm… not so sure that’s a word.) The character development was also quiet impressive, giving background to even the simplest of characters enabling us to FEEL the traumatic situations they were going through.

Now on to the bad. Sweeney was only seconds away from oozing Velveeta when it came to weapon enhancements. While I am an admitted action freak, and read books that are very rarely considered “normal,” his need to make a flying car (think Dukes of Hazard) might have been just one step too far. There were also cliché’s thrown about like confetti that (at times) were distracting and halted the flow of the story.

Overall I think this was a very solid start to a promising new series, and who knows… maybe now that Sweeney has his action feet tucked securely underneath of him he won’t feel so compelled to force the originality of Jaclyn’s toys.

In the end…I think it’s well worth the money.

Happy Reading my fellow Kindle-ites and remember: never mess with the kiddies… it’s a one way ticket to deadville.

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