Out of the hundred or so e-mails he received daily, nine out of ten were fun to read. The entire process took about twenty minutes to go through.
One caught his attention that he couldn’t quite process. It was neither fan nor hate mail. The subject read: Your presence is needed.
The sender expressed his gratitude for Rich’s involvement with local charities and community outreach. At the end, Waelim, the author, asked Rich for help in organizing a social uprising. Their movement needed him in order to gain traction and credibility. It wasn’t often that people requested his assistance, but this was different. Rich scanned to the end of the message and found the man’s signature and tried to figure out where he was from. Iran? Egypt? Middle East? New Jersey, maybe? That’s odd. There was a blog and Facebook link, a video attachment, and a headshot, but he hesitated to click it for fear of a virus. He read the message again, perplexed as to why his help was needed, then realized that the sender said he was from Saudi Arabia.
“Why the hell does he want my help?” Rich mumbled.
Instead of clicking on the link, he copied and pasted the man’s name into Google on a new tab and waited for the results. An instant later, the various links for his blog and Facebook account were displayed.
Rich took another sip of his drink. “Here goes nothing,” he said, and clicked on the blog link. Sure enough, the same person who had written him was on the page. There were various links, as well as YouTube videos and pictures of the man and others. He hit the back button, found the Facebook link, and clicked it. He was relieved his computer hadn’t done anything weird—so far. The same videos and pictures that were on the blog reappeared on Facebook, so at least more than likely the man was who he said he was. But Rich’s gut was telling him that he was on to something, and he was determined to figure out if it was a hoax. But how? Any schmuck with a computer and knowledge of basic Photoshop could put this together.
“Aw, screw it,” Rich said. It wasn’t every day a challenge like this presented itself, plus the investigative reporter in him was chomping at the bit.
Josh Handrich (2012-11-10T22:25:11.443889+00:00). o 29ed0fc4c826768d (Kindle Locations 133-151). Kindle Edition.
There is a lot going on in the world today, and it is harder than ever to tell the difference between your enemies and your friends; at least when you’re talking on the world stage. When reporter Rich Fordham goes after the story that would cement his name amongst the greatest stars of television journalism, he gets caught up in a plot that twists and turns until Rich is no longer sure exactly who he can trust.
Josh Handrich’s Kingdom of Rage is an excellent, high intensity thriller that grips you by the hand and pulls you along at a breakneck pace. I would love to give you some details here, but I don’t want to ruin any of it, but I will say that as the events unfold you want to think that it wouldn’t happen that way, but the writing is so good, and the storytelling so compelling that instead you scratch your chin and say, “yeah, I can see that,” and feel all of the appropriate emotion to match the scene.
The characters are all distinct and believable, each with their unique set of character traits that helps to make them something more than the archetypes they could easily represent. While I have never been to the Middle East, the author paints a picture of it that helps the reader feel a sense of familiarity that can be hard to achieve. The books pace is quick and has enough ups and downs in it that I often had to check my Kindle to see how much more of the book there was.
If there is a problem with this book it is that the main character sets some events in motion early in the book, and doesn’t tell the reader what he has done. While I understand the need for this in order to keep the suspense high, it occasionally felt like a little deus ex machina on occasion. It may have been better to drop a couple of hints along the way so that when the preparations come into play the reader can have that AHA! moment.
I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who enjoys some high action and political intrigue.
You can buy the book HERE.
My review of Josh Handrich’s first novel: Raw Vengeance.
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