Memorial Day

Fearless counterterrorism operative Mitch Rapp is called upon to fight against the world's most deadly terrorists in this harrowing political thriller by New York Times bestselling author Vince Flynn.

It's just seven days before Memorial Day, and the nation's capital is buzzing with last-minute preparations for the unveiling of the magnificent new memorial honoring the men and women who fought in World War II. Despite the hopeful energy of the city, Mitch Rapp senses trouble. A spike in CIA intelligence has pointed to a major terrorist attack on the United States. Now it's up to Rapp to pull out all the stops.

Rapp immediately leaves for Afghanistan, where he leads a special forces unit on a daring commando raid across the border into a remote Pakistani village. Their target: an al Qaeda stronghold. Within a subterranean room, Rapp and his team discover a treasure trove of maps, computers, files, and bills of lading for multiple freighters heading to U.S. ports -- all pointing to plans for a catastrophic nuclear attack on Washington, DC.

Information is quickly relayed back to CIA headquarters, and a nuclear emergency support team scrambles to the scene. In a few hours, the freighters have been located and disarmed and the danger has been averted. Or has it?

Despite all the backslapping and congratulations, Mitch Rapp can't shake the feeling that the operation seemed just a bit too easy. Rapp follows his instincts on a quest to unearth the whole truth. What he finds is truly terrifying, and with Memorial Day closing fast, Rapp must find a way to prevent a disaster of unimaginable proportions.

Packed with the heartstopping action and political intrigue that Vince Flynn's fans love, here is a stylish thriller exalting America's past battles for freedom as well as its continued fight for peace.

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Mitch Rapp returns. Flynn introduces him bluntly to those who have not read his prior novels as he prepares to interrogate five al Qaeda operatives who have been captured in a raid on a secret stronghold: "Calling Rapp a counterterrorism operative was essentially a polite way of ducking the truth. When everything was stripped away, the reality was that that he was an assassin. He has killed, and killed often, for his country, and in his mind 9/11 was proof that he hadn't killed enough."

His interrogation produces the picture of a terrorist attack on the United States that involves a nuclear weapon. The picture is clear enough to cause alarm, but fuzzy enough to make the entire plan a puzzle.

Slowly the puzzle seems to be solved and just when it looks like the threat is past, well, it isn't.

This is vintage Flynn. It is an absolute page turner. It will make you think. It may cause some angst. It should. This is a realistic picture of where we are and what we are doing, both the good and the bad. That's where the angst comes in.

46 of 51 found the following review helpful:

Very impressed with Vince Flynn.Nov 01, 2004
By Brad Cooper "Author of Guilty by Association"
Although I had heard of Vince Flynn's series of novels featuring Mitch Rapp, MEMORIAL DAY is the first one I decided to take for a test run. What I found what an action-packed thriller set at a blistering pace and a main character that may not stay inside the box that the government would like for him to, but you like him anyway. You have to...he does things the way you'd like to see them done and he gets results.

MEMORIAL DAY is also a prime example of the way that the CIA/Spy/International Thriller genre is headed in a post-9/11 world. In the 80s, the villians tended to be Russian. Now, the targets have become Al-Qaeda and those countries that harbor and support them. Not to worry...there are still plenty of Russian villians running loose in popular fiction. MEMORIAL DAY's premise begins with Mitch Rapp foiling an attempt to smuggle a nuclear weapon onto American soil, and right around one of the biggest tourist holidays on the calendar. This plot element alone makes the entire storyline plausible. This is something that every American citizen fears whenever there is a large event planned. New Year's Eve in Times Square...the Super Bowl...the World Series...name it. I won't go into any more detail on the plot...you'll just have to read it.

I was very impressed with the writing as well. Sharp, concise, and to the point but not over the top vocabulary. Everything is organized well and easy to follow for any reader.

All in all, I was very impressed with this very enjoyable read and look forward to checking out the rest of the Mitch Rapp series...not to mention the next installment.

65 of 76 found the following review helpful:

strong action thrillerMay 06, 2004
By Harriet Klausner
Intel learns that countries harboring terrorists are transferring their stock and bonds into gold while at a top-secret installation a Pakistani terrorist is being interrogated by CIA black ops agent Mitch Rapp. Intel finds out that Al Qaeda is preparing to strike at the United States, making the World Trade Towers destruction seem like a child destroying a toy. Mitch and a group of commandos raid a small Pakistani mountain town where they find proof that Al Qaeda is getting ready to attack America.

Going through the documents and the computer disks, Mitch and other operatives believe that the terrorist group is trying to smuggle a nuclear bomb into the United States. Through diligent effort and good investigative work, they are able to locate the bomb which was being shipped into the country by boat. Further Intel lead Mitch to believe that a second bomb has already been smuggled into the country and it is set to go off at the White House festivities on Memorial Day if Mitch can't locate it in time.

Vince Flynn is one of the best writers of action thrillers on the world scene today. His protagonist is a true patriot, willing to get his hands dirty if it means saving innocent lives. He can't stand or deal with the politics that get in the way of catching terrorists and believes the legal rights belonging to ordinary people should be suspended for active terrorists. Readers won't know until the last paragraph if the hero finds the nuclear bomb and is able to prevent it from going off. MEMORIAL DAY is more frightening than a horror tale because the premise of the story is all too plausible.

Harriet Klausner

14 of 15 found the following review helpful:

What say I, Bill O'ReillyAug 24, 2004
By Kevin D. Hayes "kickland writer"
Although I never read books of this genre a Bill O'Reilly article inspired me to give this one a try. "Memorial Day" is a cold slap reminder that we are at war, and if we are ever going to put a stop to this insidious menace the politicians, protesters,lawyers and bureaucrats--along with their career concerns--need to take a backseat to folks with intuition and common sense . Flynn's damn-straight style of writing complements the hero Mitch Rapp very well. Flynn's epilogue is thought provoking and curiously ominous.

13 of 14 found the following review helpful:

DON'T GIVE MITCH A BAD RAP.....Apr 28, 2007
By Red Rock Bookworm
Although liberals and the ACLU would no doubt be horrified by the tactics of our protagonist, Mitch Rapp, I firmly believe that the general population of readers will find themselves cheering his methods of extracting information as he attempts to track down a group of terrorists attempting to cripple the infrastructure of the U. S. and kill hundreds of thousands by setting off an atomic device in Washington D.C. (No more plot details from here on).

My first Vince Flynn book, Term Limits, hooked me completely and I have been a Vince Flynn fan ever since. Once again, he has crafted a clever story that could easily have been taken from your daily paper.

If you like complex, action packed thrillers featuring the most elite of alpha males, then Mitch Rapp is your kind of man, and Memorial Day is your kind of book.

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