Due to a sudden, unexpected passing in the family a few years ago and another more recently and my subsequent (mental) health issues stemming from that, I was unable to download this book in time to review it before it was archived as I did not visit this site for several years after the bereavements. This meant I didn't read or venture onto netgalley for years as not only did it remind me of that person as they shared my passion for reading, but I also struggled to maintain interest in anything due to overwhelming depression. I was therefore unable to download this title in time and so I couldn't give a review as it wasn't successfully acquired before it was archived. The second issue that has happened with some of my other books is that I had them downloaded to one particular device and said device is now defunct, so I have no access to those books anymore, sadly.

This means I can't leave an accurate reflection of my feelings towards the book as I am unable to read it now and so I am leaving a message of explanation instead. I am now back to reading and reviewing full time as once considerable time had passed I have found that books have been helping me significantly in terms of my mindset and mental health - this was after having no interest in anything for quite a number of years after the passings. Anything requested and approved will be read and a review written and posted to Amazon (where I am a Hall of Famer & Top Reviewer), Goodreads (where I have several thousand friends and the same amount who follow my reviews) and Waterstones (or Barnes & Noble if the publisher is American based). Thank you for the opportunity and apologies for the inconvenience.

Rick Campbell http://rickcampbellauthor.com is the author of six novels. Deep Strike was published in 2021 and is the sixth novel in his Trident Deception series. It is the 35th book I completed reading in 2023.

Opinions expressed here are unbiased and entirely my own! Due to scenes of violence, I categorize this novel as R. The novel has many characters, though the ones that stand out are Lonnie Mixell, Christine O’Connor, Jake Harrison, Aleksandr Plecas, and John Buglione.

Former US Navy SEAL Leonard ‘Lonnie’ Mixell has turned rogue. He fires a shoulder-launched missile at a diplomatic vehicle convoy in New York City. Several occupants are killed, including the US ambassador to the UN.

As devastating as the attack is, it is only his opening salvo. If he can carry out his scheme, the results will be worse than 9/11. CIA Director Christine O’Connor is in the thick of the hunt for Mixell. She reveals to her team that she knew Mixell in High School. In fact, she, Mixell, and retired SEAL Jake Harrison had been best friends. The CIA hires Harrison to help track down and bring in Mixell. The trail leads him to Syria.

Meanwhile, the Kazan, Russia’s newest nuclear-powered guided missile submarine, has put to sea. The Kazan is commanded by the respected officer, Captain First Rank Aleksandr Plecas. Plecas though is under the control of Mixell. The Captain’s daughter has been diagnosed with a rare form of cancer. In exchange for carrying out a missile strike against the United States, Mixell has promised expensive experimental drugs for the girl.

The US submarine USS Pittsburg is tracking the Kazan. The Kazan fires upon the Pittsburg, and Plecas does what he can to evade the US sub nd get within firing range of the US.

There ensues a dual race. One to find and stop Mixell. The other is to find and stop the Kazan.

I enjoyed the 7.5+ hours I spent reading this 346-page thriller. While this novel is part of a series, it reads well as a stand-alone novel. That said I recommend starting with the first novel, Treason, the previous book in this series. It is very bit as good as this novel. I like the chosen cover art. I give this novel a rating of 5 out of 5.

You can access more of my book reviews on my Blog ( https://johnpurvis.wordpress.com/blog/).

My book reviews are also published on Goodreads (https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/31181778-john-purvis).

Great thriller which kept me turning the pages well into the night. Great characters and plot. Highly recommend to others!!

Thank you to NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book. Not a bad read but not a great read. The plot follows a fairly predictable line with nothing too unexpected happening. The story will keep your interest but is nothing that can't be put down to start up the next day. Merely OK.

If you take a Tom Clancy book, remove the tension, dumb down the dialogue, remove half the adjectives, and delete most of the character development, you've got this book. The problem is that this book is twenty years out of date. It would probably do well if it was packaged as a Young Adult fiction book for those who want a start at reading this style of novel. But for anyone who has been reading this genre for a few years, it's like - nothing to see here, move on.

At one point I was waiting for one of the villains to give an evil laugh, twirl his mustache and tie a damsel to a ground-to-air missile. To say that the characters are undeveloped, would be to acknowledge that there were characters. People get shot two or three times and shake it off like, it's ok it's only a flesh would, yeah right in the abdomen.

Yes, I know this a very successful series, but that doesn't mean that it's good.

As a former Nuclear trained Submarine Officer, Rick Campbell knows submarines. I myself was a submariner and aside from writer’s authority, the operations, lingo, and lifestyle aboard a submarine is spot on.
Campbell does a phenomenal job at creating realistic scenes with the worlds end potentially left hanging in the balance. A father with the love of his child so deep that he wagers the fate of the world on getting his daughter the medical treatment that she needs. Captain Murray Wilson returns to ensure that the needs of the free world are met to pilot the USS North Carolina and stand vigilant while a mad man runs wild with weapons meant on turning the world into a wasteland.
I have had the pleasure of meeting Mr. Campbell and he is not only a great author but a great person. His service to this country makes his writing authentic, real, and void of nonsense. If you are into submarines, submarine warfare, and all-American characters protecting the good ‘ole USA, this is one that will grab your attention and keep you entertained.

Published by St. Martin's Press on March 16, 2021

Deep Strike is a story of submarines chasing and shooting torpedoes at other submarines. That’s what I look for in a Rick Campbell novel. The rest of the book is an ordinary thriller, but the underwater scenes are exceptional. This is the sixth book in a series but if you just read it for the action, you can easily get by without the context provided in the earlier novels.

The plot is driven by a villain named Lonnie Mixell who (too coincidentally) was the college buddy of Jake Harrison, a CIA paramilitary operations officer who has played the role of hero throughout this series. Mixell is a SEAL who went to prison and now has a grudge against the American government.

Using funding from al-Qaeda, Mixell bribes a Russian submarine captain to fire missiles at twenty American targets. The Russian captain accepts the bribe because his daughter has a disease that won’t respond to conventional treatment, although a very expensive treatment will save her life. That’s just a bit too convenient, but it sets the action in motion and maybe that’s all that matters. The Russian thinks he’s firing conventional missiles, not knowing that additional bribes have resulted in nuclear warheads being substituted for conventional warheads. As if that won’t cause enough mayhem, Mixell has an additional plan to cripple the American government that is revealed late in the novel.

Harrison has his work cut out for him, but much of the story takes place underwater. Early in the novel, an American submarine trails a Russian sub as it leaves port. Unaware that the Russian sub is commanded by a desperate man who plans to attack the US, the American commander thinks he’s on a routine mission.

After the mission takes an unfortunate turn, it’s up to a bunch of smart people with expensive technology to figure out where the Russian sub might be headed. Another American submarine sails into action, leading to the aforementioned submarine warfare. Campbell always combines technical precision with tactical savvy to create gripping scenes as submarine crews shoot and dodge torpedoes.

Some aspects of Deep Strike are bothersome. In the tradition of implausible thrillers, a villain captures a hero, wastes time explaining his plan to the hero, and then keeps the hero alive so that the hero can thwart the plan. Why doesn’t the villain just kill the hero before he carries out the plan? Because then the thriller wouldn’t have a happy ending.

A second plot thread involves Harrison’s partner, who seems to be a psychopath. Harrison is warned to keep an eye on her because her partners tend to die. Instead of reporting her behavior when she engages in unnecessary violence, or later when she ponders killing Harrison to prevent him from reporting what he saw, Harrison gives her a pass. I mean, team loyalty is one thing, but letting a crazed killer stay in her job without at least calling the boss’ attention to her professional inadequacies seems like piss poor job performance. The plot thread is an unnecessary distraction, particularly since another of Harrison’s partners also turns out to be less than ideal. How much bad partner drama does a thriller need?

The scenes leading up to and following the submarine warfare are standard thriller fare. They are executed with competence, but they aren’t fresh or exciting. Harrison’s non-relationship with CIA director Christine O’Connor, a character who played a central role in some earlier novels, gains no traction in this one. They both fret about what might have been but that’s old news, recycled from earlier novels. Neither of them has enough personality to make the reader care about their relationship. As far as I’m concerned, everything else in the book is ho-hum background to the real point of a Rick Campbell novel: submarines in action. But for me, and perhaps for other fans of submarine thrillers, that’s enough.

RECOMMENDED

After the American ambassador to the UN is killed in a bold daytime attack perpetrated by a disgraced former Seal Lonnie Mixell, the CIA recruits his former friend Jake Harrison to hunt him down. Meanwhile a Russian submarine on its maiden voyage sinks a US submarine that was tailing it and disappears.  The CIA discovers that with money from Al Qaeda Mixell has masterminded a nuclear attack on the US. The hunt is on to find both the rogue sub and Mixell.

I found the beginning a bit slow but informative with all the details about submarines and naval warfare. Then the action picked up and this became a nail biting read.  This was the first Rick Campbell book I've read and I'm definitely going to read this series starting at the beginning.

Harrison is called back into service by the CIA when it is discovered his old high school buddy, Mixell, who now hates Harrison with a passion for turning against him during Seal ops when Mixell killed prisoners of war, has become an ardent enemy of the United States who he fervently believes has also betrayed him. Mixell masterminds a multipronged attack intended to take out all who "betrayed" him. Harrison's job is to stop him. A decent read typical of the series.

This is for fans of military thrillers- and Campbell's fans. Mark Alperi, a disgraced ex-SEAL, is on a vengeful streak. He's behind an attack on the UN and now he's convinced a Russian sub commander to help him launch a truly awful assault on the US. And he's using money from terrorist groups. Only one man can stop him - Jake Harrison. There isn't much in the way of character development - although the good guys and bad guys are very clear. It is, however, a very plot driven action novel which means you'll be turning the pages. As implausible as some of this is (at least I hope it's implausible), it makes for a good armchair read (would be a good airplane read if we were doing that). Thanks to the publisher for the ARC. Part of a series but perfectly fine as a standalone.

Book Review: Deep Strike (Trident Deception #6) by Rick Campbell
(Published by St. Martin's Press, March 16, 2021)

4.5 Stars.

"To help the story move along without getting bogged down in acronyms, technical details, and military jargon, I simplified the dialog and description of operations and weapons systems....

I did my best to keep everything as close to real life as possible while developing a suspenseful (and unclassified), page-turning novel.

Hopefully it all worked out and you enjoyed reading."

- Author Rick Campbell, retired US Naval commander

Well, Rick, it does work out!

With proficient knowledge of the specifics through direct experience as a former naval commander, situational creativity and an agreeable writing style, the reader in for a gem of a read!

-----

"...Pilot, left ten degrees rudder, steady course zero-six-zero. Make your depth four hundred feet..."

Staged in Pakistan, Syria, Moscow and the Russian Northern Fleet "Ice Curtain" K- submarine base at arctic Gadzhiyevo, Russia, across the Atlantic to Washington, D.C. and Langley, Virginia, the scope of action is of such magnitude that the assassination of a US ambassador and such are but cameos runs.

The naval warfare and spy fiction techno-thriller focuses on two main spheres of action:
- the global hunt for a terrorist; and,
- the hunt and kill US ASW (Anti-Submarine Warfare) deployment and blockade against K-561 Kazan, a Yasen class attack submarine, Aleksandr Plecas, Commanding.

Due to the scope, a list of main characters is necessarily rendered before the prologue, such as that which one may find in a major movie production.

Lead protagonists Christine O'Connor, Director, CIA, Jake Harrison, paramilitary CIA officer, Lonnie Mixell, former Navy SEAL, Aleksandr Plecas, Commanding Officer of K-561 Kazan, and Murray Wilson, most senior captain in the Submarine Force are complemented by a full array of players in the US Administration, the CIA, DNI, officers and men of US Los Angeles and Virginia fast attack submarines; the Russian Federation, the FSB, Russian Northern Fleet Joint Strategic Command, officers and men of the Russian Yasen class submarines.

Plus, looming out of real life, Ayman al-Zawahiri and Al-Qaeda.

"High value target. That's all you need to know."

(It's the aftermath of a skirmish of global proportions between the US and Russian naval fleets. The Russian military had staged a coup d'état, then took overt action against US military assets. With US intervention, Russian civilian government was restored with the Russian fleet largely annihilated.

The Russian Federation is now slowly rebuilding and refitting its devastated fleet with the launch of its newest nuclear submarine,

- the K-561 Kazan, a Yasen class attack submarine...)

----

The novel is slightly reminiscent, and, frankly, dwarfs in scope a personal favorite, "The Hunt for Red October" by Tom Clancy, one of my all-time favorite authors (through his passing in 2013) whose extensive repertoire does extend beyond submarine warfare.

On tap by the author, following "Deep Strike" Book 6 is Books 7 and 8 (both still to be released) to form a trilogy featuring protagonists Mixell, O'Connell and Harrison.

Certainly, top priority on my TBR, along with "Treason" Book 5, released in 2019.

And Mr. Rick Campbell - definitely an author to be followed.

Highly entertaining. Recommended!

Review based on an ARC from St. Martin's Press and NetGalley.

Definitely one for Tom Clancy fans. This is part of a series but you don’t need to have read the previous books.
As an act of revenge on the US a two pronged attack is planned. The instigator is an American ex-SEAL using Al Qaeda money to bribe a Russian submarine captain to launch missiles at the US, the captain not knowing that his standard cruise missiles have been replaced with nukes.
So we have a cat and mouse chase at sea where American forces try and locate and destroy the Russian sub while on land the intelligence agencies are tracking down the perpetrators. It is very Clancy, the mix of big picture with the action at the operational level. Good set of characters and the technology feels spot on. Nearly everything works really well, except maybe for one “reveal” that is a bit telegraphed.
But this gives everything you could ask from a techno-thriller. There are some books I have yet to catch up on from Rick Campbell and this was a good reminder that I need to do so.
My thanks to NetGalley for a review copy.

Keeps the action pulsing with enough intrigue to make it hard to turn the virtual pages fast enough. Thoroughly fleshed-out characters you tend to either like or dislike with enthusiasm. A great bedtime read that'll keep you engaged till the very end. Highly recommended!

*This book was provided free of charge in exchange for my honest review. My thanks to the author, publisher and NetGalley for allowing me to participate in this program.*

3.25* An intriguing thriller involving a rogue Russian submarine carrying nuclear warheads in a plot that targets the United States. The plan was hatched by a disgraced US Navy SEAL whomis out for revenge and funded by a rebuilding Al Qaeda. There are a lot of characters in this book. It's easy to get confused, although there is a handy guide to who's who at the back of the book. Maybe if I had read the other books in this series, it would've been easier. One could say the main protagonist is Jake Harrison, former Navy SEAL who is hired by CIA to stop this plot. I wish he featured in more of the book, but alas, the plot does not really allow for it. There are a lot of details about submarines and submarine warfare. Have to confess that those details slowed the story right down for me. But, for those who are interested in such things, these would be fascinating and educational. The action, when it occurred, was exciting. I certainly enjoyed the last third of the book more than at the beginning.
**Thanks to Net Galley and the publisher for providing an ARC in exchange for an honest review.**

An excellent thriller which I really enjoyed.
I must admit I learned an awful lot about submarines (which I didn't expect) but the detail took nothing away from the tension of the story.
A satisfying conclusion, albeit one where I guessed the twist, and I've added the author to my 'favourites' list.
Many thanks.

Wow, what a great story. This is the first Rick Campbell book that I’ve read, and I’m thrilled that there is another five in this series to read. It’s always exciting to find a new Author that can grab your attention, with a thoroughly well written and entertaining story. It’s full of great characters, and a plot that I really enjoyed. I sometimes found myself reading faster and faster to find out what was going to happen. Brilliant!!
Lonnie Mixell was a man out for revenge. With the close bond that all Navy Seals had for each other there was no way that he thought one of his own, especially his good friend Jake Harrison would turn him in. After all, killing a prisoner during war time should have been more than ok. Getting locked away for so many years had made Lonnie very angry, so Jake Harrison was on his list for pay back, and he was just behind the number one on the list, America. Soviet Captain Alexsandr Plecas felt totally helpless. His daughter was quite ill in hospital and a cure seemed to be out of his reach. There was no way he could afford the medicine that might heal her, or was there?
If you enjoy thrillers that are full of action and suspense, then you will certainly enjoy this book. 5/5 Star Rating.

An intriguing story and plot by Patrick Robinson. Good character development and plenty of action/suspense to keep the reader involved.

Thank you to #netgalley for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

I am grateful to St. Martin's Press for providing me with an ARC for Rick Campbell's forthcoming novel "Deep Strike." For those of you not familiar with Campbell's canon, he is something of a specialist in naval warfare, with emphasis on submarine warfare. I have read many of his books, and cannot recall ever being disappointed. "Deep Strike" revolves around a terrorist plot to utilize a Russian nuclear sub to devastate the American heartland. From the first pages, it is a page turner with few pauses in the action. Campbell's particular strength is knowing how to navigate (no pun intended) the submariners' community and most particularly their weapon systems and the way they employ them, and he is clearly on top of his game in this exciting novel of suspense and undersea warfare. Without giving too much away, the book is a techno thriller much along the lines of Tom Clancy's groundbreaking "The Hunt For Red October," and if you enjoyed that book, you will surely enjoy this one. One of the things that I like about Campbell is that he knows the limits of what he can get away with given the constraints of very real security issues and the limits of a general audience's knowledge of military jargon. He explicitly reminds his audience that this is a work of fiction in a field where much information is closely held. Nonetheless, you leave this novel, like the others that preceded it, with an enhanced understanding of what modern subsurface warfare is like, even in times of "peace."

A really good complex book in the vein of the old Clancy books. This is my first book from the author but I plan to purchase his other books in this series. It starts with a brazen daytime attack on a convoy of officials from the UN including the US ambassador. The US is now on the hunt for the mastermind of this attack. This attack is more than it seems and leads to a very intricate plot to destroy the US. This is a really good book. I want to say more but don't want to give away any of the plot. I highly recommend this book.
Thank you Netgalley, Rick Campbell and St. Martin's Press for the ARC for my honest review.