The Year of the Locust

Very mild spoilers in here, not really directly mentioning any of the plot, but if you don't want to know anything you probably shouldn't be reading personal reviews like this.

Like many others I had been greatly looking forward to this after 'I Am Pilgrim', and the first half to two-thirds is pretty good, not up to the previous novels standard but still good, then it, well, it takes an unexpected turn into basically a different genre for 60-100 pages and then sort of returns to what it started out as.

It didn't deter me, but it was certainly jarring and the story at that point is rife with trite cliches as well (maybe it always was and I just didn't notice till that point), and I forged on and finished it, but what I did finish wasn't the book I started.

Really odd it's almost Hayes got about two-thirds through, and something happened (COVID at a reasonable guess, not that it has has anything to do with the plot, but it does get mentioned), it's like he just couldn't decide what to do with it so made a radical sidestep. I suppose if you look at two of the more famous screenplays he was responsible for you get an inkling of where things could go from the standard spy far I thought I was getting.

What a cracker book! The Year of the Locust starts off as a traditional spy novel, with a Denied Access Areas spy, Kane, travelling to Iran to meet a contact who can give the CIA information on a new terrorist cel. This part of the story takes most of the first 3/4 of the book and is a rollicking read. But then it gets weird, with a magical submarine, a time slip and zombie aliens... And then the ending is excellent, deep inside a Russian no go zone. All in all a non stop, intelligent, well planned thriller. 5 stars.