Darkness Under Heaven, by FJ Chase
A Review of This Year's Most Compelling Thriller
Jul 20, 2009 Christopher Pascale
Darkness Under Heaven, by FJ Chase, brings readers to Beijing, China where security consultant and retired US Army colonel Peter Avakian is covering an international gymnastics competition where several VIPs are to attend, including the President of Taiwan.
Following the assassination of the Taiwanese President, war begins to erupt between the two nations. For those not familiar, there is no love lost between them as China sends a daily airmail of missiles upon its neighbor.
As the war unfolds, Avakian and his friend, Dr. Judith Rose, are getting to know each other over dinner and coffee when the streets erupt in cheer over the unofficial outbreak of the war. In their failed attempts to blend into the crowd and make it to their hotel and then out of the country safely, trouble finds them as Avakian is forced to defend himself and his companion, leading them to have to hide and then make their way out of China on their own.
For all of the suspense and action, Darkness Under Heaven has what every thriller should have:
- An understanding of the culture and places of the the story's setting
- Great action balanced with believable dialogue
- Author credibility
Darkness Under Heaven Brings Readers Into the Hearts of China and the Chinese
While reading through the first 100 pages of the 400 that comprise this work, readers find themselves being introduced not only to the story's two heroes, Peter Avakian and Dr. Judith Rose, but also to the surroundings of Beijing and its people.
While another thriller may leave the people of China looking foolish without reason, Chase lets his readers into the hearts and minds of the Chinese, showing the average person to be impoverished and denied while a select few are granted opportunities unequally, and far fewer achieve certain status by hard work and good fortune.
Chase Offers Great Dialogue With Bouts of Humor Matched With Honest Narrative
Whether Peter Avakian is helping Dr. Rose recover from shock after seeing him kill three people in self-defense, or a Chinese police commissioner and a Chinese general are in the midst of a power struggle over an American spy who has sabotaged the city's public utilities to cause unrest among the people, the dialogue is worked into the narrative well enough that the balance between the two work extremely well.
Unlike some action books or films where the the dialogue introduces critical character background to explain one's expertise seconds before a reader would need to know it, Darkness Under Heaven appropriately introduces the characters' backgrounds and abilities with dialogue that serves to read just as many would be expected to speak in the given situations.
FJ Chase is no Vince Flynn, and Readers Should be Glad
Fans of Vince Flynn's novels, such as Term Limits and The Third Option, will appreciate an author such as FJ Chase. Not only does the action play out with a bit less ideology than Flynn's hero, Mitch Rapp, but the disparity between the creators of these works is very attractive as well.
FJ Chase is the pseudonym of a former US Marine infantry officer. Vince Flynn is the real name of a former salesman who failed the physical to get into the Marine Corps. Chase is a security consultant. Flynn is a consultant for the hit television series 24, starring Keifer Sutherland.
Overall, readers should enjoy this novel thoroughly with hopeful anticipation that another FJ Chase thriller is in the works, preferably with Peter Avakian as the hero if not his son, a US soldier stationed in South Korea during the events that take place in Darkness Under Heaven.
FJ Chase's New Novel, Darkness Under Heaven
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