The Chaos Agent
The superb, action-packed new Gray Man thriller
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4.2 • 99 Ratings
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- $15.99
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- $15.99
Publisher Description
Artificial intelligence leads to shockingly real devastation in this new novel in the #1 New York Times bestselling Gray Man series.
A car accident in Japan.
A drowning in Seoul.
A home invasion in Boston.
Someone is killing the world's leading experts on robotics and artificial intelligence. Is it a tech company trying to eliminate the competition or something even more sinister? After all, AI may be the deadliest battlefield gamechanger since the creation of gunpowder.
Meanwhile, the quest for a quiet life has led the Gray Man to Central America, where he and his lover Zoya Zakharova have assumed new identities. Eventually, they're tracked down and offered a job by an old acquaintance of Zoya's: to extract a Russian scientist who is on the kill list. They reject it, but just being seen with him is enough to put assassins on their trail.
Now, they're back on the run, but no matter which way they turn, whoever's tracking them is always one step ahead. Since flight's no longer possible, fight is the only option left, and no one fights dirtier than the Gray Man.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Greaney's formulaic 13th outing for former CIA agent Courtland "Gray Man" Gentry (after Burner) finds the ex-spy lying low in Guatemala when he learns a ruthless contract killer is on his trail. As Greaney soon discovers, the assassin has been hired by criminal mastermind Cyrus to eliminate key military figures conducting research on weaponized AI so he can harness the software for his own nefarious ends. The chilling central question of who will win the race to integrate AI and weapons of mass destruction is the best feature of a novel that otherwise reads like subpar Tom Clancy or the hasty novelization of a CGI-heavy streaming series. While Greaney's fans will get what they came for—nonstop action and long, fetishistic descriptions of weapons including rifle-mounted robot dogs—the plot feels slapdash and contrived. This military thriller is mediocre at best.
Customer Reviews
Formulaic
The author is a best-selling American thriller writer (the Gray Man series, several post-Clancy Jack Ryan novels).
Our hero (aka Court Gentry, Sierra Six, Violator) is enjoying time off with his Russian one-time-nemesis-turned-love-interest Zoya (aka Anthem) in the jungles of Central America when they are drawn back into yet another improbable adventure involving killer bots and drones as well as plain old flesh and blood killers, an AI super intelligence created by a megalomaniac Kiwi tech genius, and an epic shoot out in a former Soviet spy facility in Cuba involving a US covert ops team, local military and a whole mess o’ the aforementioned autonomous weapons. They’re nowhere near Bay of Pigs though. That would have strained credibility too much.
When the dusts settles, Zoya’s been kidnapped by the Chinese and passed on to the Russians, setting the stage for an inevitably death defying rescue volume 14.
‘Publishers Weekly’ described ‘The Chaos Agent’ as “formulaic.” While the same could be said for most books in the series, it is especially true in this case. I think I’m over the Gray Man.