Thursday, April 2, 2015

William Brown’s “Burke’s War”


Bob Burke heads a telecommunications company. He’s flying back to his home base of Chicago from Washington, D.C., where he learned that the Defense Department is chucking his company’s bid for a major work program in favor of a lesser known company. It could mean layoffs. He’s not in the best of moods, and trying to drown his problems with Scotch. As the plane comes in low for landing, he looks down from his window, and sees a man strangling a woman on a rooftop.

Bob Burke’s life is about to turn upside down.

That’s how Burke’s War by William Brown begins, and it never lets up. The flight attendant, the airport police and the local police all disbelieve his story. But Burke knows what he saw, and he’s rather relentless in pursuing what he believes was a murder.

Burke, a former special forces soldier in Afghanistan and Iraq, finds himself up against an estranged wife who’s determined to get control of the business; the head of a pharmaceutical company with a penchant for violent rape; the pharmaceutical company’s security; and part of the Chicago Mafia. People begin to die, including some close to Burke.

Burke declares war. Shootings and violence pile up.

If you like action and suspense, William Brown packs it into his stories. The reader hands on as events propel the narrative forward.

William Brown
Do I believe things like this could have in suburban America? No. Did that stop me from enjoying this story? Also no.

Brown is a storyteller. From the very beginning, the reader is wrapped into this unlikely of heroes, a young CEO trying to save his company. We gradually learn there’s more to this CEO than meets the eye. So do the bad guys. And there are a lot of bad guys.

Burke’s War is described as the first in a series. I can’t wait to see what the “telephone guy” gets up to next.

Related - My reviews of Brown’s previous books:






Photograph of Chicago skyline (facing west toward Michigan Avenue) by Matt Hobbs via Public Domain Pictures. Used with permission.

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