On this mission, he’s up against a formidable opponent: Special Agent in Charge, Naomi Templeton has the Secret Service in her genes and has recently been promoted to Deputy Director of Protective Intelligence and Assessment. And as the daughter of a former Director, she has something to prove. But Hank Templeton, now languishing in an Aged Care Facility, could also be a distraction. What Evan Smoak isn’t initially aware of is the dangerous man who has been tasked with killing him. The conflicts he faces trying to reconcile his past with the present, the desire to be free and live normally, is ever present, but not as prominent in this episode. Instead, Evan perfects the fine art of compartmentalizing. Each segment of his life requires his undivided attention, without one interfering with the other. Somehow, he shows up for Mia, for Anjelina, her father, and Joey, while fighting off some of the worst hardened criminals around. For me, unfortunately, much of that storyline was a drag. What I did love, however, was the return of Joey Morales. That girl is a hoot and a half! The interaction between her and Evan saved the day for me. Then there was Evan’s relationship with Mia and her son Peter, which gave us all some heart palpitations.

The two meet and there clearly is some friction yet Aragon has made his money. Billions is alluded to and further he knows what's right and what's wrong. The relationship between the two is pretty cool and believable. X will help him but he has to stop his drug dealing. The plotting is clever, the action is nearly constant and usually over-the-top, and X has something resembling a moral core. Bad guys get what bad guys deserve... Hurwitz fans will certainly enjoy this latest entry in the series." - Kirkus Well, now. This was the ultimate showdown! I was riveted from the start and the story never let up. Going after a sitting US president is a formidable, seemingly impossible task and Evan was sorely challenged and engaged with some unusual bedfellows. The action was over the top and über exciting, utterly breathtaking at times. Bennett and Orphan A knowing his moves and logic made things even more dicey for Evan with a lot of point/counterpoint. Here, the life of Evan Smoak and all other Orphans (including Joey Morales, the one whose life he saved in “Hellbent”) are on the line and it’s up to Evan to save them from the man who is out to kill them. The problem? It’s the one man in the nation who it is impossible to kill and get away with. Like freaking impossible - and yet, Evan has come up with a plan to do exactly that. How does Gregg Hurwitz do that?). There's supposed to be one more Orphan X book and I can't wait for it!Even if by a miracle someone was able to actually penetrate the most secure building on earth, the White House was equipped with further contingencies yet. The interior hid not just countless panic buttons, alarms, and safe rooms but also multiple emergency escape routes, including a ten-foot-wide tunnel that burrowed beneath East Executive Avenue NW into the basement of the Treasury Department across the street. Caring about people makes him vulnerable in ways he hasn’t been in the past, but it does allow us to enjoy him as a man, at least now and then. And it helps him understand the vulnerability of the people who call the Nowhere Man on his special Roam-Zone phone. That has a secret number to be used only by someone who has been given it by the last desperate person he helped.

The ending of the book was as superb as all that came before it, did Orphan x manage to kill the President?......you will find out when read it 😎 Taken from a group home at age twelve, Evan Smoak was raised and trained as part of the Orphan Program, an off-the-books operation designed to create deniable intelligence assets—i.e. assassins. Evan was Orphan X. He broke with the Program, using everything he learned to disappear and reinvent himself as the Nowhere Man, a man who helps the truly desperate when no one else can. But now Evan's past is catching up to him. As with the other Orphan X novels, other orphans are involved, some evil and making a returning appearance, and some good.He set his hands on the bars of the eight-foot-high gates. The trees of the South Lawn formed a funnel leading to the White House, which would have been a fine metaphor for Evan’s own narrowed focus if he were the type to bother with metaphors. Starred Review. Fans of the previous books in the series will not want to miss this latest installment featuring a complicated, swift-paced plot involving numerous twists plus a surprise ending - the essentials that make up a great thriller. Enthusiasts of suspense dramas should plan to stay up all night reading this one." - Library Journal It was also good to see Joey again and hope to see more of her in future books. The "Uncle Cousin" role she put Evan into was fun to imagine. Gregg Hurwitz has said that the initial idea of this series was to take a Bond or Bourne type of character and put him in real world social situations, where the expert covert operative becomes awkwardly inept. Of course, it has been done before, most notably in Dexter (socially awkward vigilante Dex -- rhymes with socially awkward vigilante Orphan X), as well as Alias, and I'm sure there are others. But it works nonetheless, though it must move forward in the next entry for it to mean something.

A scene for the good ol’ boys among Hurwitz fans. Then there are highly choreographed battles between Evan (mostly alone) and a dozen or so bad guys with no redeeming features, so we won’t worry too much about their being crushed by a gate. He does his best to avoid or minimise collateral damage, but it’s going to be hard this time, when his target is the President of the United States. A complicated, swift-paced plot involving numerous twists plus a surprise ending—the essentials that make up a great thriller...Plan to stay up all night reading this one." — Library Journal (starred review)

Out of the Dark

Oh, and there was so much gory violence, it felt like I was wading knee-deep through blood. I haven't felt like that since Stuart MacBride's Cold Granite. This was an intense and fast read for me. Thank goodness there was Joey to help break the tension. Mia’s situation was also a little too overwhelming on top of everything else that was going on, and I confess, there were times I felt a little mentally drained and physically exhausted. I don’t have Evan Smoak’s training, after all. As a boy, Evan Smoak was pulled out of a foster home and trained in an off-the-books operation known as the Orphan Program. He was a government assassin, perhaps the best, known to a few insiders as Orphan X. He eventually broke with the Program and adopted a new name – The Nowhere Man―and a new mission, helping the most desperate in their times of trouble. But the highest power in the country has made him a tempting offer - in exchange for an unofficial pardon, he must stop his clandestine activities as The Nowhere Man. Now Evan has to do the one thing he’s least equipped to do – live a normal life. We don’t call it Death by PowerPoint for nothing! He flies around the world on his cases, occasionally getting “home” to his fortress-like flat in a building where Mia and son Peter live, two people he’s come to care for.