The Target
David Baldacci
Pan Macmillan
R599
Pp 400
GOVERNMENT ASSASSIN Will Robie is back in David Baldacci?s latest thriller, The Target. This time, he teams up with agent Jessica Reel, whom he was sent on a mission to kill in the previous book of the series. This promises a good chase after the bad guys and a cracking mystery. Unfortunately, there is no mystery to solve, and the plot is fragmented into two-three sub-plots, each having no connection to the other.
Moreover, things get intensely personal as agent Reel faces demons of the past in a father she would rather forget and her rapist, who happens to be the father of her abandoned daughter. Of course, the duo of Robie and Reel manage to outmanoeuvre both the bad guys, but that?s an outcome that is boringly obvious.
The other plot involves Baldacci?s favourite victim, the President of the United States. However, this time, it?s not the President who is in danger, but his family, who are the target of a revenge-seeking North Korean suicide group.
But before all this happens, Baldacci takes the readers through what life must be like in the concentration camps of North Korea and on its streets. Tales of horror and suffering emerge, in stark comparison with life in America, where people ?laugh too much?.
More soppy stories emerge in the life history of former concentration camp victims Chung-Cha and 10-year-old Min, who survive against all odds to reach America. Chung-Cha is the leader of the North Korean suicide group, but has a heart of gold, and eventually dies an American martyr.
In-between is another plot that held some promise?a military coup in North Korea aided and abetted by the US. But Baldacci gives up on this even before any action happens, leaving the reader short-charged, and inevitably thinking of his riveting previous novels like Split Second. The comparison is similar to the one between North Korea and the US!