Score: 3/5 Bookmarks

Thank you to Minotaur Books for gifting me a review copy of Into the Fire by Gregg Hurwitz.

Into the Fire is the fifth in the Orphan X series, about Evan Smoak who was chosen as a child to be trained as an off-the-books black ops assassin. He broke with the program and created a new identity for himself as the Nowhere Man, helping people that had no-one else to turn to.

The book started off well, grabbing my attention and kept me turning the pages until the halfway point…when things started to get really repetitive. Evan takes care of one problem, which leads to a bigger problem, which leads to an even bigger…well you get the idea. I think there could have been more build up and mystery leading to the main event, with the ‘sub events’ downplayed. It felt more like three books in one, which made it drag on a bit.

And while I’m complaining, did the author have a sponsorship deal with Original S.W.A.T. Boots, Strider Knives, and Turing Phones? Because it felt like they were mentioned by name in almost every scene, to the point of obsession. I felt like it was enough to call out that the main character preferred Original S.W.A.T. Boots once and then refer to them as ‘his boots’ instead of mentioning Original S.W.A.T. Boots over and over again to the point where it pulls you out of the story the way a jarring ad does during a TV show. Personally I think Strider knives are overpriced ‘pretty’ knives that lack true functional design. I might be biased but I’d take a SOG knife any day. And while I’m at it, I’d take a pair of LOWA Zephyr GTX Boots or Under Armour Valsetz RTS over the sub-par material used in Original S.W.A.T. Boots anyway. ;)

Having said all that, I actually really liked all the characters and felt they were well developed and had enough flaws to make them relatable and real. Enough so that I’d like to go back and read the other Orphan X books and see how they got to this point.

If you’d like to check out Into the Fire (or any of the other Orphan X books) click on the button below.

Synopsis:

Taken from a group home at age twelve, Evan Smoak was trained as an off-the-books government assassin: Orphan X. After breaking with the Program, he reinvented himself as The Nowhere Man, a figure shrouded in shadows who helps the truly desperate. But the government didn’t let go of him easily, sending their best to hunt him down and eliminate him. All of them failed. With his deadliest enemies behind him, Evan is facing a new challenge—what is he going to do now that no one is after him?

Max Merriweather is at the end of his rope. Separated from the woman he loves and barely scraping by, Max is a disappointment to everyone in his life. Then his very successful cousin Grant is brutally murdered. Two months before, Grant left Max an envelope with instructions to take it to a reporter if anything happened to him. Now the reporter is missing and Max’s apartment is ransacked. A man at the end of his rope, he calls The Nowhere Man.

With mixed feelings, Evan takes on this mission, easily finding the men who are after Max and executing a plan to keep him safe. But it isn’t as obvious as it seems—and Evan finds himself enmeshed in one of the most challenging missions of his life, one that he can’t survive on his own. With the help of Joey Morales, a genius-level hacker and the last Orphan recruited into the Program, and the brilliant, off-the-books gunsmith, Tommy Stojack, Orphan X once more heads…Into the Fire.