NEVER by Ken Follet

Never by Ken Follet

Book review

Genre- Fictional Thriller

Spoilers- None

For a moment there I was thinking like this is the sequel to the Novel Called Afghan by Frederick Forsyth then I remembered Ken’s great works like the Man from St Petersburg and how he was back into the thriller genre with a bang and how!

Only Ken can make things so interesting that you know there will be something juicy in the coming pages!

The backdrop of the beginning of the novel is the Middle East desert and the Jihadis! Am sure it is sure to raise some eyebrows!

Two chief protagonist are Abdul and Tamara; one Arab turned American and another just another American both working for the CIA! later on major character like Kai a Chinese intelligence officer is added
Then one of the chief characters is the president of US who is a lady! Then after some amazing introductions and routine prez work she is shown to be solving a teen girl problem! It’s endearing how Ken humanises even the most powerful post in the world! Pauline Green is the ever human president who trie to save her marriage and tries much harder to save the world from a nuclear war!

The whole novel goes from one character to another in sequence with closure provided only for two characters while the end is left of a big cliffhanger very similar to the end of sacred games season 2!
Another chief sequence of the novel is the DEFCON levels! Every big section starts with a level and a small note on when it was actually used and then it goes up the level (up or down is for you to read and find out!)

In between he humanises the characters even if that person is the president of US or an agent of the CIA! As far as I was concerned the best part of the novel is the trials and adventures of Abdul the agent and as I mentioned before he was eerily similar to the super character who was an Arab and American in Frederick Forsyth novels (as I remember there were two with this character and both these were so thrilling!). The way Abdul manages to get intelligence and survives the ordeal is simply amazing and I had a feeling that that was the chief direction of the novel! Just at the end of that character plot you have a surprise ending and then there’s that! The whole storyline then changes into the war of words and wits of the two chief leaders, the president of US and the PM of China and how they get influenced by their juniors and advisors and Ken has shown how major decisions are made with not intelligence but with emotions!

In China’s politics you always have the old players who are strictly communist vs young protagonist who is a litte liberal. The flow of information between agencies is a breeze though it’s an open secret but secrets can lead to complications!

Now the whole story starts with a soldier from a major country in another minor country is shot by the guns supplied by it’s major competitor country and then it’s landslide from there! Hope no spoilers here!

With US and China now replacing US and Russia of James bond movies or US vs German of the world war stories; the new war or war stories is between these two apparently!
So many treaties are mentioned which may be true but are just as soon thrown in garbage with great abandon!

US supports South Korea while China is a silent supporter of North Korea who has a supreme leader as it’s president! Both leaders of one side are ladies while of the other are gents!
The leaders speaking to one another is just eyewash! So is the press conference, the regular scandal and the routine barking and nonsense speaking opposition!

All in all a very fast paced racy thriller of recent times till it takes a very dark turn in the end!
Ken Follet Novels are huge but you just can’t stop! In between two audio books I somehow squeezed this one!

Grab it with both hands and NEVER let go till you finish!