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TIANANMEN ASCENDING

From the The Dragon Proxies series , Vol. 1

An enthralling, action-packed novel about a hero’s courageous call to action in the wake of a realistically portrayed attack.

Awards & Accolades

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In Alan’s debut political thriller, the governments of Iran and China join together to coordinate deadly terrorist actions on American soil.

One Monday morning in Washington, D.C., Navy SEAL sniper Lt. Cmdr. Cam Nite watches six 45-foot recreational vehicles drive onto the Francis Scott Key Memorial Bridge, screech to a halt, and explode in the middle of traffic. The bridge is destroyed, and a stunned Cam has a flashback of his second tour with SEAL teams in Iraq, when he survived a devastating explosion that claimed the lives of 10 Marines and crew members. Back in the present, a series of coordinated suicide bombings across the capital ensues, and Cam jumps into action to rescue civilians and take down terrorists. As the novel progresses, the narrative jumps among Cam; Iranian Deputy Cmdr. Gen. Hossein Hamedani, the orchestrator of the terrorist attacks; the pompous, unnamed president of the United States and his White House associates; and agent Xi Gang of China’s Ministry of State Security. Readers quickly learn that China and Iran conspired in the attacks as a larger conspiracy with the end goal of eliminating the United States’ status as a world leader. Alan delivers a gripping, imaginative, and meticulously researched novel that looks at the what-ifs of modern-day United States foreign relations by drawing on his own lifelong personal enthusiasm for the subject of geopolitics. (In an introduction, he informs readers that, at the age of 8, he sent a letter of protest to Iran’s embassy in response to the Iran Hostage Crisis and was sent back a packet of propaganda, which sparked his interest.) In this novel, he effectively examines how Americans’ fear of terrorism increased after the tragic attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and he uses this awareness to create scenes of riveting, cinematic action and suspense. Overall, this thriller is highly recommended for readers who enjoy cerebral, absorbing narratives about contemporary politics and the devastating potential of global terror.

An enthralling, action-packed novel about a hero’s courageous call to action in the wake of a realistically portrayed attack.

Pub Date: June 15, 2016

ISBN: 978-0-9971167-0-0

Page Count: 444

Publisher: 2nd City Press

Review Posted Online: Feb. 8, 2017

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SUMMER ISLAND

The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...

Talk-show queen takes tumble as millions jeer.

Nora Bridges is a wildly popular radio spokesperson for family-first virtues, but her loyal listeners don't know that she walked out on her husband and teenaged daughters years ago and didn't look back. Now that a former lover has sold racy pix of naked Nora and horny himself to a national tabloid, her estranged daughter Ruby, an unsuccessful stand-up comic in Los Angeles, has been approached to pen a tell-all. Greedy for the fat fee she's been promised, Ruby agrees and heads for the San Juan Islands, eager to get reacquainted with the mom she plans to betray. Once in the family homestead, nasty Ruby alternately sulks and glares at her mother, who is temporarily wheelchair-bound as a result of a post-scandal car crash. Uncaring, Ruby begins writing her side of the story when she's not strolling on the beach with former sweetheart Dean Sloan, the son of wealthy socialites who basically ignored him and his gay brother Eric. Eric, now dying of cancer and also in a wheelchair, has returned to the island. This dismal threesome catch up on old times, recalling their childhood idylls on the island. After Ruby's perfect big sister Caroline shows up, there's another round of heartfelt talk. Nora gradually reveals the truth about her unloving husband and her late father's alcoholism, which led her to seek the approval of others at the cost of her own peace of mind. And so on. Ruby is aghast to discover that she doesn't know everything after all, but Dean offers her subdued comfort. Happy endings await almost everyone—except for readers of this nobly preachy snifflefest.

The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with syrupy platitudes about life and love.

Pub Date: March 1, 2001

ISBN: 0-609-60737-5

Page Count: 336

Publisher: Crown

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001

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LAST ORDERS

Britisher Swift's sixth novel (Ever After, 1992 etc.) and fourth to appear here is a slow-to-start but then captivating tale of English working-class families in the four decades following WW II. When Jack Dodds dies suddenly of cancer after years of running a butcher shop in London, he leaves a strange request—namely, that his ashes be scattered off Margate pier into the sea. And who could better be suited to fulfill this wish than his three oldest drinking buddies—insurance man Ray, vegetable seller Lenny, and undertaker Vic, all of whom, like Jack himself, fought also as soldiers or sailors in the long-ago world war. Swift's narrative start, with its potential for the melodramatic, is developed instead with an economy, heart, and eye that release (through the characters' own voices, one after another) the story's humanity and depth instead of its schmaltz. The jokes may be weak and self- conscious when the three old friends meet at their local pub in the company of the urn holding Jack's ashes; but once the group gets on the road, in an expensive car driven by Jack's adoptive son, Vince, the story starts gradually to move forward, cohere, and deepen. The reader learns in time why it is that no wife comes along, why three marriages out of three broke apart, and why Vince always hated his stepfather Jack and still does—or so he thinks. There will be stories of innocent youth, suffering wives, early loves, lost daughters, secret affairs, and old antagonisms—including a fistfight over the dead on an English hilltop, and a strewing of Jack's ashes into roiling seawaves that will draw up feelings perhaps unexpectedly strong. Without affectation, Swift listens closely to the lives that are his subject and creates a songbook of voices part lyric, part epic, part working-class social realism—with, in all, the ring to it of the honest, human, and true.

Pub Date: April 5, 1996

ISBN: 0-679-41224-7

Page Count: 304

Publisher: Knopf

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1996

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