Search - BLACK HEART

ISBN 0449202704 - Written in 1982, there are some interesting parallels to current US politics - such as: "Gentlemen, we have seen all too often in recent years the escalation of incidents of terrorism against the United States of America in Iran, West Germany, Egypt and Peru... And I say to you now, our time is soon coming." This part of the book is well done - one man, using the fear of acts of terrorism on American soil, plans to build and control a puppet government. Had this been the whole book, it would probably deserve a better rating.

Unfortunately, the book is somewhat confusing at first, jumping from the 1960s in Cambodia to the present day (1980s) in the US, with characters whose paths crossed and whose names are somewhat similar (Kim and Kheiu; Sampang and Sokha). Until the author gets around to defining their personalities better, it's just a phonetic distraction. Character development is given less ink than pornographic sex scenes and boring blow-by-blow fights for a majority of the book.

It's remarkably hard to care about most characters and since most of them are dead by the end, it's hardly worth the effort anyway. Harder to understand is the return of Lauren to Tracy Richter's life and how they're proclaiming their love almost instantly. If this is a carry over from a previous novel, it will make sense only if you've read both, which I haven't; otherwise, it's a little romance-novel-ish. Ultimately, Black Heart isn't really good for much - readers looking for the porn parts will be let down by the sheer volume of other junk they have to get through to find them; if you're looking for the fight scenes, the intrigue, the romance, same problem - it's all there, but this book is trying so hard to be a little of everything that it doesn't amount to much of anything. A bad book can still be readable, but bad AND long? Too much effort, too little payoff.

- AnnaLovesBooks