The Last Patriot: A Thriller

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 café, 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:

my review

The book was just a so so novel. There was too much "alphabet soup" references to various agencies to suit my taste-- made it too hard to follow trhe plot in places.

2008-09-30

Spellbinding

This is my first Brad Thor Book. It is by far the best book I have read since Noble House. Thor has the ability to intertwine history with fiction and produces a most riveting read. I especially enjoyed reading Chapter 16 about the Barbary Pirates. I remember my High School history book characterizing State sponsored Islamic Terrorists as being mere pirates. Admittedly, the vast majority of Muslims are peace loving people but the politically correct Washington establishment wants to cast a blind eye to the most significant threat since WWII. If only 1% of Muslims are terrorists then we have 15 Million people committed to the destruction of the United States. That is too many people to ignore. Brad Thor is a breath of fresh air. Now excuse me while I read the rest of his books.

2008-09-29

Kept Me Interested

I had never read anything by Brad Thor before, and I picked up the audiobook for "The Last Patriot" to listen on a road trip to Las Vegas. I didn't really know what to expect, except that I didn't want something too deep, and I wanted something both myself and my boyfriend could enjoy. He's very much into political thrillers, me less so unless the story is easy to pick up.

This book fit the bill. I know several reviewers are saying this book compares to "The DaVinci Code," but I didn't see it. "The DaVinci Code" was a supposed mystery (and a not very good one at that), whereas this book is a political thriller - to me, a different genre entirely. It kept me interested, though I was unaware the character of Scot Harvath was a continuation. My boyfriend was okay with it. This was the first time he had listened to an audiobook, and he found himself becoming distracted at times.

For the purpose it was intended, the book delivered. It's not earth-shattering literature, and it's certainly not the Great American Novel, but it's pleasant enough. I suppose there is some un-politically correctness in that Islam is portrayed in a unflattering light. My response to that? It's a novel, it's fiction, get over it.

For light, escapist reading, this book did okay. It makes me interested to know what Brad Thor's other works are like.

2008-09-22

Ineffective - more like Da Vinci Hack

The premise was encouraging - Thomas Jefferson was George W Bush on steroids against radical Muslim. He had suspected the "lost chapter" from Koran could change Islam and, during the course of several battles fought by US Navy, discovered the bit. Flash forward, present day president Rutledge spent his own money to fund where Jefferson hid it. What followed were "brain swelling from stress", description of some very cool gadgets / guns top US agencies use, several improbably gun fights and even a somewhat interesting twist to the 2005 riots on the streets of France. The story never really recovered after first ten chapters or so. Things like a fed who is not a secret service agent can go play pool with President in white house with a gun in his waist did not really help. This novel was more of a Da Vinci hack.

2008-09-21

DaVinci In Da Terror Cells

The action never stops in this excellent thriller about the threat to modern civilization posed by radical Islam. It's built around a DaVinci-Code-like secret about the prophet Mohamed's last revelation, a secret that threatens to undermine the basic tenets of Islam.

Thor's hero, former Navy SEAL Scot Harvath, gets dragged into the search for the secret, competing with everybody from a murderous convert to Islam to the CIA and FBI to solve the puzzle. Gun play, car bombs, and plenty of skin-of-the-teeth escapes keep the story moving along at a quite satisfactory pace.

Dave Donelson, author of Heart of Diamonds: A Novel of Scandal, Love and Death in the Congo

2008-09-20