BLACKOUT

In Bennecke’s novel, a grieving civil engineer is swept up in a desperate mission to save America from a sophisticated drone attack aimed at the country’s power grid.

In this third installment of the Jake Bendel Thrillers series, the titular character is unexpectedly summoned to Washington, D.C., after receiving some shocking news: The plane he was supposed to have been on earlier that day crashed, killing everyone on board, due to a suspected drone-related explosion. This event turns out to be just the first element of a plot to cripple the United States via massive, coordinated drone strikes on the country’s power grid. The plan—years in the making, with quiet support from multiple countries—is overseen by Tracy Ciacchella, a woman who intends to “take down the United States and install a new world order to run the entire planet.” As the attacks ramp up, Jake and his allies at the FBI scramble to secure the power grids with advanced AI technology, but they’re running out of time. Shocking revelations—including new information about Jake’s deceased wife and an unexpected connection to Tracy herself—come to light, throwing everything into question as Jake begins to wonder whom he can really trust. Bennecke delivers a smart, twisty political thriller that keeps things moving at breakneck speed. Jake’s grief over losing his beloved wife is deftly woven into the novel’s action, acting as an important catalyst and providing some of the story’s biggest shocks while never overshadowing the threat at the narrative’s center. While Tracy’s over-the-top villainy can sometimes come across as a bit one-note (“Yet another reason to raise my curtain of death”), her high-tech methods to punish the United States for its hubris are truly fascinating. The result is compulsively readable, a relentless game of cat-and-mouse with some genuine surprises.

A taut and timely thriller that balances questions of technological advancement with plenty of twists and turns.