Brannan's Chase

Brandon's Chase by Stephen Cord: Joe Brannan and his boat, the Betty, are hired by three university types to search for possible areas to create artificial reefs along Thailand’s coast; however, it turns out they are really CIA. The Navy has lost a super weapon, and it is thought to be somewhere near the coast of Pattaya. Problems arise when a local Korean smuggler steals the weapon before the team can retrieve it, and now it’s heading for China en route to North Korea.

There is lots of action from the very beginning, as the Koreans kill two CIA agents and capture the third, framing Brannan for the murders. Joe is forced to run before the Thai police can arrest him, and now he needs to take the CIA woman away from her Korean captors to prove his innocence, but that isn’t going to be easy.

The Brannan series is the best new men’s action novels I have read in a long time. The author’s writing is fast, and the story flows smoothly, with plenty of action and suspense to keep the reader on the edge of their seats. Even though it appears the author may have killed off one of the more interesting characters in this story, I’m not totally convinced we’ve seen the last of North Korea’s highly trained Korean agent, Sook-Ju. I would certainly like to see her return in a future story, as she almost took the story away from the lead character. The read is definitely fun, and highly recommended.