MATT GANNON

Matt Gannon is an agent with the CIA.

When we first meet Gannon, he is serving in the U.S. Army holding the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and assigned to the prestigious Multinational Force Operations, excelling as a forward observer and becoming friends with a wide assortment of people from the dozen-plus countries that made up that group.

Prior to that even, Gannon had been a commander of a company during Desert Storm. It was in that capacity that he learned how important planning and logistics were to the success of any mission. Certainly he had been taught it over and over in officer school but as he discovered, there was learning and then there was really learning. If in a hostile land you outstepped your backup and your supply line, the enemy does not give second chances. This lesson would prove vital when he retires and leaves the Army and finds the CIA had some missions of their own for him.

As mentioned in the first recorded adventure: "The still-young Lieutenant Colonel was built on a five-foot-eleven inch frame, albeit having been put together a bit wrong. Nonetheless, he carried his 192 pounds well; distributed across broad shoulders, a modest waist, athletic narrow hips and strong, heavy thighs and legs. The true strength of Matt's body was focused in his lower torso. The dimension and development of the muscles in his legs and hips would have well-served a 230 or 240 pound man. The meat and strength of muscle to drive and smash forward on the short yardage downs was evident."

Further, it added "Age-wise, he could still pass for five or maybe even six years younger than he was. Of course, that was with the assistance of soft light that did not betray the thickening web of crow's feet around the corners of his eyes. He was, at thirty-seven years of age, in better physical shape than most of his college classmates. He could hold the pace with troops ten to fourteen years his junior during the more vigorous morning runs and physical training drills of garrison life." That being said, he was well aware of the fact that his best days were behind him and fifteen years of soldiering has taken its toll.

Three separate adventures make up this series but it is also largely a trilogy as the same rat-ba#$%@rd of an adversary keeps refusing to lie down and die. Gannon has to keep going after him which turns out to be annoying for him (and I am sure the bad guy) but not so much with the reader as the author makes the chase interesting.

Gannon is as solid a guy as you would want. He does not intend to become an operative; it just sort of happens. He is, in his mind, a soldier and having made it to the rank of Lt. Colonel, he obviously is a fairly good one.

The writing for this series is quite enjoyable and the story flows swiftly and surely, always a good sign. It has been a decade and a half since the first two books came out, followed a few years later by the third. That many more years have since passed without a new adventure so perhaps Gannon's days of recorded missions are over. That is a shame since they were quite good.