Crisis: the action-packed Sunday Times No. 1 bestseller

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This effects the pace of the plot as well as character development and due to the underdeveloped characters and character relationships I didn't really feel connected to any of them throughout. Sent into the steaming Colombian jungle to investigate the murder of a British intelligence officer, Luke finds himself caught up in the coils of a plot that has terrifying international dimensions. While we are obviously supposed to root for the success of the couple, halfway through she snogs a man who is such a cliche of arseholery (name of Hugo, Goldman Sachs banker, slick back hair etc etc) that she is clearly a dick. Unfortunately Elise is not the only superfluous element in Crisis, although she is the most significant and irritating. Frank Gardner however, whilst not resorting to Le Carre-style kitchen-sink realism, definitely wants the reader to feel they’re being shown an accurate portrayal of contemporary intelligence gathering and espionage, not a world of tricked-out Aston Martins and bikini-clad babes (the former even gets a jokey reference in the book’s dialogue, as if the author was trying to make a none-too-subtle point).

I will be giving the next thrilling installment of Luke "Babes" Carlton's adventures a very wide berth indeed. There is no room for any emotional journey or introspection from the main characters and it can be difficult to keep track of the parallel stories with so many secondary characters in walk-on parts. Introducing Luke Carlton – ex-Special Boat Service commando, and now under contract to MI6 for some of its most dangerous missions. While I did not find this a slow start to the story, neither was it a ramped-up, heavily action orientated type of beginning that a lot of thrillers are expected to have nowadays. A novel so pedestrian, trite and unintentionally funny that it reads better as a satire on the genre than as genuine thriller.As a somewhat newbie to this sort of book, it felt like James Bond meets Alex Rider with a healthy dash of grown-up thrown in. With excellent characters, a modern and realistic outlook to our current world and solid plotting and pacing, I thought this was an exceptional spy/thriller style of story and I am eager to read the author’s next offering.

Combining insider knowledge up-to-the-minute hardware fly on the wall insights with heart-in-mouth excitement CRISIS boasts an irresistible visceral frisson of authenticity: smart fast-paced and furiously entertaining here is a thriller for the 21st century.

At the same time, though, there was a strong touch of the current world circumstances and a very modern feel to it all. Drawing on his years of experience reporting on security matters, CRISIS is Frank Gardner’s debut novel. Villains make mistakes under no pressure, maybe because of ego, but again, given the plot, it leads to the reader somewhat guessing the consequence of the mistake. Awarded an OBE in 2005 for services to journalism, Frank published his bestselling memoir, Blood and Sand, in 2006. Luke Carlton is the protagonist, an ex-Special Forces officer who has gone to work for MI6, Britain’s foreign intelligence gathering service.

In June 2004, while reporting in Riyadh, Frank and his cameraman, Simon Cumbers, were ambushed by Islamist gunmen. Unfortunately by introducing her and then finding ways to shoehorn her into the plot, all Gardner does is slow down the narrative unnecessarily, add yet another unrealistic and ultimately superfluous, yet entirely predictable, subplot (from the moment in the opening chapters that you find out Elise knows martial arts you’re just waiting for her to be placed in a situation where she needs to use them) and irritate the reader. I really did enjoy the main character Luke, we didn't really get to uncover a hell of a lot about him.Then, best of all, as you turn the final page after the inevitable full-cast acceptance/affirmation/validation of our hero, you are offered the first chapter in the next book.

There are a lot of characters but other than Luke, Elise Angela and Jorge, the rest aren't really memorable. He has, in addition, used his considerable knowledge of security – being the BBC’s Security Correspondent – to produce a great, page-turning debut novel. This is a literary territory rather overpopulated at the moment, with swaggering 21st century pseudo-Bonds crawling out of the woodwork everywhere. Carlton (and his bosses) eventually discover a plan that is ingenious, cunning and poses a real threat to the UK.Elise was a frustratingly annoying presence and their was little rapore between any of the main characters. I was hooked from start to finish: fast-paced, action-packed, thrilling, full of suspense and drama this book has it all. In his quest for authenticity the author neglected to make the characters believable as actual human beings which makes it difficult to care about the outcome. We got to learn a bit about his line of work being a secret agent for the London MI5, we learnt a bit about his younger years when he grew up in Colombia (the other half to the novels setting), but mostly we got to learn about his lovely girlfriend Elise and their budding relationship which was slightly hindered due to his line of work. What might have helped though, would have been a central character with enough charisma or complexity to let the reader overlook the inherent implausibility of the villainous conspiracy.