The Last Patriot: A Thriller - Dark Publications

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Editorial Reviews:

Product Description
Brad Thor, master of suspense and New York Times bestselling author of The First Commandment, returns with his highest-voltage thriller to date. In a pulse-pounding, adrenaline-charged tour de force, Navy SEAL turned covert Homeland Security operative Scot Harvath must race to locate an ancient secret that has the power to stop militant Islam dead in its tracks.

June 632 A.D.: Deep within the Uranah Valley of Mount Arafat in Mecca, the Prophet Mohammed shares with his closest companions a final and startling revelation. Within days, he is assassinated.

September 1789: U.S. Minister to France Thomas Jefferson, who is charged with forging a truce with the violent Muslim pirates of the Barbary Coast, makes a shocking discovery - one that could forever impact the world's relationship with Islam.

Present day: When a car bomb explodes outside a Parisian cafe, Scot Harvath is thrust back into the life he has tried so desperately to leave behind.

Saving the intended victim of the attack, Harvath becomes party to an amazing and perilous race to uncover a secret so powerful that militant Islam could be defeated once and for all without firing another shot, dropping another bomb, or launching another covert action.

But as desperate as the American government is to have the information brought to light, there are powerful forces aligned against it - men who are just as determined that Mohammed's mysterious final revelation continue to remain hidden forever.

What Jason Bourne was to the Cold War, Scot Harvath is to the War on Terror. Brad Thor has created "the perfect all-American hero for the post September 11 world" (Nelson DeMille) and will keep readers glued to the pages as he once again takes them across the globe on a heart-pounding chase where the stakes are higher than they have ever been before.

Customer Reviews: Read 123 more reviews...

5 out of 5 stars

Extremely entertaining and thought provoking July 1, 2008
125 out of 133 found this review helpful

I became a fan of Brad Thor after I read 'The First Commandment' and could not wait for his next one. There was a very nice lady at Simon & Schuster who heard my cry and sent me a copy of this one and it did not disappoint!! Of course this one will catch a little flack because it raises some questions about the religion of Islam and questions the validity of Muhammad and the Koran. I loved how Brad interwove history in with the story and about just how long this war with some of the homicidal, radical Muslims has been going on. This is a mystery, suspense, thriller rolled up in one!

I love authors who have that special "it" that make you keep reading and reading and makes you take an extra 5 minutes on your lunch just so you can finish the chapter. The kind of writing that actually makes you tell your wife, "Hold on baby I'll hook you up after I finish this page!" Yeah, this book is THAT good! This will definitely be one of the best political-thrillers you'll read this year and will, if you aren't already, make you a die-hard fan of Mr. Thor!!

I'm not a big non-fiction reader but I love history. So I really appreciate when an author takes history and makes it fun, interesting, and not so freaking boring! I know authors (including this one) take liberties with history and the re-telling of it, but I can live with that because it just makes me go out and see if what they say is true. Did our former Presidents know about the Muslim invasions BEFORE this country was even a country? Did Adams and Jefferson know something and leave us clues to help us? Did our forefathers know how completely stupid, impotent, and P.C. our leaders would be (have) become?

I say YES to all 3 but you'll have to read this book and do your own research to figure that out. Either way 'The Last Patriot' is one heck of a book and a must read for this summer and seasons to come.

5 out of 5 stars

Thor KNOWS how to write a controversial thriller...and this is IT July 2, 2008
17 out of 19 found this review helpful

The character of Scot Harvath has been one of my recent favorites in the last 3-4 years since discovering Thor's books, and 'The Last Patriot' virtually cements this bold character into (at least MY version) of great leading Action/Adventure Hero's.

Controversy is nothing new to Brad Thor by any means...however, with that said, I believe he is courting a whole new set of problems, or seriously potential problems with the storyline here. Religion in general is a very touchy subject, but as we have seen over the last decade or so, even fictionalizing specific events in Muslim History can be viewed as MAJOR Blasphemy--the kind that involves life-threatening retaliation. Don't believe me? Anybody remember Salmon Rushdie's 'Satanic Verses'? 'Nuff said. I heard an interview done with Thor on Glenn Beck and I'm not the only one concerned here. I honestly feel that if somewhere, sometime soon if I read about Brad Thor being the target of Terrorists, well, let's just say it won't surprise me (read the book and you'll understand).

The book, though is a hum-dinger of a story. Easily Thor's best-to-date. Like other reviewers, I like when events in history are tied in with current storylines, and I REALLY like it when its done right...and I am happy to say Thor really nails it with this latest installment. Action on top of intrigue firmly attached to a healthy dose of adrenaline mixed with a Titanic-sized load of action and you have an idea of how well constructed 'The Last Patriot' truly is. I have enjoyed these books a lot since I first began them, but this one seriously places the bar at a level that is amazingly high compared to the previous Tales of Scot Harvath--and THEY were great, if that tells you anything.

One thing I enjoy in particular about Harvath is that no matter how death-defying his exploits end up being, I always find myself thinking that were I under similar circumstances, and I had Scot's talent, what Thor describes is pretty much dead-on with how I feel I would act and say--or at least what I'd like to THINK I would act and feel if our roles were reversed--which I am glad they aren't.

For those who are fans of how Cussler takes historical events and weaves a seamless tale of adventure into a modern tale of action, you honestly owe it to yourself to give Brad Thor a try--and while you don't HAVE to start at the beginning to appreciate each book, I personally feel that by starting with 'The Lions of Lucerne' you will get a much better appreciation not only for the character of Scot Harvath, but you will get a ringside seat to Thor's growing talent for storytelling that just gets better with each book...no REALLY.

Kudos to Thor for not just a good addition to this series, but EASILY the best to date by a country mile...and that's saying a LOT.

5 out of 5 stars

The threat of Islam as a well-done thriller July 16, 2008
16 out of 20 found this review helpful

Thriller authors generally need a real world enemy to wrap their story around. Few are like Michael Chrichton who invent everything. No, for most thriller authors, it is the threat of the moment that matters. Nazism and Communism have had their day, but today belongs to radical Islam.

Brad Thor has cranked out several very good thrillers, but "The Last Patriot" is one of his best.

Former Navy SEAL, Secret Service agent and Presidential troubleshooter Scot (with one "t") Harvath is in Paris with his girlfriend Tracy Hastings, who is still recovering from injuries received in her job as a Naval demolitions specialist. Scot observes a car being stolen and another car pulling into the vacated parking space. His intuitive sense of action is aroused and he pulls Tracy away from the cafe where they were sitting. Passing a bookstore, a stranger in a hurry bumps into them and starts crossing the street. Scot senses trouble and covers the stanger with his own body as a car bomb goes off.

Borrowing liberally from Dan Brown's "The DaVinci Code", Thor plunges Harvath into a labybrinth of clues, assasins, plots and counter-plots as a search for the prophet Mohammed's rumored last revelation which has the potential to change the nature of Islam.

The action never stops. A former CIA assassin, Matthew Dowd, now a dedicated convert to Islam and a stone-cold killer is murdering his way toward the secret. The President's man is looking for the secret. Soon the CIA and FBI are involved. Thomas Jefferson's 1805 war against the Barbary pirates is invoked as other aspects of Jefferson's wide ranging interests and genius. The plot moves from one bit of violence to another, with nary a thoughtful moment in between. In other words, this a perfectly satisfying thriller, an American flag waver.

Thor's characters have a bit of depth. Scot Harvath's exploits just make you want to stand up and cheer (provided you support the United States and its goals). Thor is particularly aggressive in his views of radical Islam and the poltically correct multiculturalists in the United States and elsewhere who are yielding democracy to a theocracy.

As noted, the plot borrows heavily from "The DaVinci Code" with the protagonist having to piece together bits of a puzzle while the bad guys are trying to kill the good guys. From time to time, Thor asks the reader to accept a jump in logic or an implausible happening, such as hairbreadth escapes. But Thor is a strong enough writer to carry the reader over the occasional chasm.

The ending, however, is on the weak side and a real stretch. I don't know if Thor ran out of time or ideas, but the last few pages weren't nearly as satisfying as those that went before.

Still, for thriller fans, "The Last Patriot" is a wonderfully jingoistic, red, white and blue story, filled with All-American heroes and nasty bad guys. Great fun reading!

Jerry

4 out of 5 stars

Will This Author Draw A Fatwa? July 3, 2008
15 out of 19 found this review helpful

A thriller with format similarities to "Davinci Code"...as much character development as one should expect from a book with this much action...miraculous escapes from danger not as far-fetched as Cussler...building to an exceptionally good ending. Unlike the author of "Davinci Code" and to Thor's credit, he includes a disclaimer after the epilogue - as to which parts of his book are fact and which are fiction.

Thor wrote this book, wondering "if there was a way I could combine the historical relevance of the Koran with Thomas Jefferson's experience with the Barbary pirates to create a thriller that would be relevant today." He then builds the book around the murderously competitive search for a previously little-known final chapter of the Koran - one that condemns violence. It seems Mohammed was assassinated over this chapter, which subsequently disappeared. Too many of his contemporaries were making their livings by looting and pillaging.

According to Thor, the tendency to violence by some radical Muslims is enabled by the policy of abrogation. That is - if two verses in the Koran conflict, the later verse takes precedence. If a last sura were found advocating peaceful co-existence, it would abrogate the earlier violent suras. According to the story, the discovery, publication, and authentization of this chapter would deal a death blow to the radical elements of Islam and force moderation in the religion.

There are items of interest to the religious scholar scattered throughout this book - for example: the moderate Muslim scholar who didn't think the Koran was perfect. Instead, he thought it contained errors of fact about human physiology, the stars and planets, and other mistakes one would expect in a book written by a man in the 600's. In another chapter, the author mentions the so-called satanic verses - where Mohammed, in an arrangement with his family's tribe, claimed it was legitimate to pray to three pagan goddesses as intermediaries to Allah. Later, he said the devil made him do it. Salman Rushdie named a book after these verses, subsequently having to live for years in hiding with armed guards. As a result of publicity from the fatwa, Rushdie probably sold a lot more copies of "Satanic Verses" than he would have otherwise. Whether political pressure had anything to do with it, the fatwa on Rushdie was eventually withdrawn.

This book would make an excellent movie for any studio with big enough cojones to consider it. No group should get a free pass from scrutiny just because it happens to be a religion. Most Christian would tell you that criticism has not seemed to hurt their cause through the years. As Thomas Jefferson said, "Our liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost."

DB

1 out of 5 stars

Unimpressive August 3, 2008
15 out of 28 found this review helpful

This was my first Brad Thor book; I picked it up after hearing lots of raves around the Internet. I was pretty disappointed. The protagonists of the dramatis personae are pretty much a Mary Sue convention. The sentence structure is awkward - there are lots of short sentences and short words, as if it was written at a third-grade level. As I finished the book, I was thinking the title should have been "Dick and Jane and Their Dog Spot Save the World From Islamists."

Most annoyingly of all, the author tends to monologue at the reader through the characters inner and spoken dialog. It's both condescending and lazy - the author can't convey ideas to the reader other than by having a character beat the reader over the head with them in simple, declarative sentences.

Finally, the plot - it's pretty much a rip-off of the DaVinci Code, only with Islam instead of Christianity and Thomas Jefferson instead of Leonardo DaVinci. Been there, done that, got the t-shirt. There were no significant twists or surprises, and no scenes that stood out in any particular way.

To summarize - boring and poorly written. 1/5 stars.

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