THE JANSON DIRECTIVE-A REVIEW(THE 1ST PAUL JANSON BOOK BY ROBERT LUDLUM)
Paul Janson is the classiest, funniest, smartest, deadliest hero created by Robert Ludlum. Being a survivor of a past filled with treachery, hardships, pain-both given and taken, violence, - Janson has come out in one piece but not emotionally unscratched. He fought as a SEAL in the Vietnam war until his commander Alan Demarest, sold out his location to the enemy on a mission to test the hero. This ended up in Janson’s capture and torture for 18 months in a VC camp. After many attempts, he actually managed to escape and hand over evidence of Demarest’s war crimes which included torture and slaughter of VC and betraying Janson, to the authorities which led to his execution. Janson then studied business at Cambridge which led him to be recruited to Consular Ops, an intelligence unit in the Ludlum universe. There Janson became a legendary operative earning the name ‘The Machine’, which actually is short for - The Kill Machine. At the age of fifty, feeling sick of the violence he was forced to perform, he left Cons Ops and became a corporate security consultant.
This is where the story starts. Janson is asked to repay a debt by rescuing a billionaire/philanthropist who’s now a captive of extremists and is due to be beheaded without any request for a ransom. Peter Novak, the billionaire had once rescued Janson when he was captured in a war torn part of the world, by paying for his release. Also, the people who captured Novak are the very people responsible for bombing an embassy which killed Janson’s wife long ago. The hero quickly assembled an awesome international team of private operatives and successfully managed to rescue the captive, only to get his team and Novak killed when his plane exploded midair. Luckily, Janson wasn’t on that plane.
As he begins to hunt for answers, he becomes a target by the very intelligence agencies he once served. Many friends and trusted people turn against him and believe him to be Novak’s killer. Also, the mysterious villain has deposited 6 million dollars in Janson’s account making it look like he was paid to kill Novak.
His quest leads him to be repeatedly ambushed by Cons Ops sniper-Jessica Kincaid- who eventually teams up with Janson, only after realizing the deceit on the part of her employers towards her. They together uncover startling revelations about Novak which is nothing compared to the enormous conspiracy involving Novak and the USA which they get to know from the Cons Ops director who asks Janson for help when he meets him. Whats more, the President and many others are involved in this program targeted to create world peace by conning the world. Also, thundering revelations spark up about Demarest. If this conspiracy would be exposed, it would spark a war, causing the world to unite against the US. Janson uses the UN to counter this conspiracy with another conspiracy trying to lure the villain into a trap
This book has action and twists in almost every chapter and is Ludlum’s best work. Also there are mentions of other Ludlum characters from another major series. Janson has brilliant technical, tactical, linguistic, strategic, and political knowledge which adds him to being a mighty hero with beyond realistic action scenes. The last third is filled with spine chilling shockers and revelations which makes it a book you must read in a lifetime. Though the ending doesn’t have as much action as the rest of the book, it is very satisfying and gives a perfect ending, which is continued by Paul Garrison and then Douglas Corleone who wrote the later books in this series. I can say that this is more thrilling than Ludlum’s original Bourne trilogy combined. I give it 5/5 stars.
