Seldom does a book affect me as “The Extinction Agenda” did. There are so many things wrong with it that it is hard to find a starting point.

The plot, a common theme nowadays, centers around a megalomaniac who is determined to start a new world order, creating panic by killing people with viruses. There’s no one to stop this man but Mason, an FBI agent who has been forced to surrender his badge. Regardless, Ex-Agent Mason assembles his own crew to battle an organization with so many tentacles into the business and political (and security) worlds that only a super-spy would be able to successfully combat this evil. TV and movie versions of Napoleon Solo and James Bond would be proud.

By the end of the book, Mason and his partners perform one incredible feat after another. My favorite was when our hero was in a dark room and shot two guns in different directions at the same time, killing both his assailants. There is not a system in the entire world his buddy, Gunnar, can’t hack into and exploit. Ramses and Alejandra both surprise and demonstrate extraordinary skills, mostly when it is necessary to fit the elaborate plot.

The writing style kept pace with the storyline. At some point, someone must have advised the author that short sentences – most times devoid of a subject, others both a subject and a verb – would increase the tension. It did, because I was gritting my teeth every other page by the end of the book. One example said the same thing three times: “The trees wavered in and out of the storm. There and gone again. There. Gone.” In an action scene, “…the Steyr slid across the floor toward them. To his right. Her left. He dove for it. So did she.” If these examples only happened a few times, they could be overlooked. Unfortunately, most of the time the reader is subjected to this writing style several times a chapter.

I could go on, describing the one-dimensional characters, the absurdity of the “surprises” and “twists” that only made me groan, and the gun descriptions that read like they came out of a sales page on the Internet. The author obviously strove to write an action-based thriller, but too many elements are over-the-top, resulting in a book that many will find wanting. I recommend for readers to pass on this one. Two stars.

My thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for a complimentary ebook of this title.

This novel had enough detail to its backstory to read like a history book. It made me wonder if there was a layer of fact upon which this fiction built. The characters were well developed - both the good and bad. I wouldn't be surprised if there was a sequel. It would also make an awesome movie! There was enough action, wavering allegiances and government conspiracy to keep me from setting the book down until I was done. This is my first read from this author, but Michael Lawrence has now made it onto my list of authors to follow. I highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys action thrillers ... although you may start seeing conspiracies surrounding current events ...

There's lot of action. A huge conspiracy to uncover. The main character loses so much that one can't blame him for going slightly off his rocker to uncover it all. I would have done the same thing. People die left and right. A horrible virus getting ready to be spread. It has everything a girl could want in a book.

I gave it 157 pages before I gave up.

I trudged on that long because I've enjoyed the author's books under a different name, and because The Extinction Agenda is well-written. It just left me completely cold. I honestly don't know why. I didn't care for any of the characters. The protagonist felt like just sort of a blank slate 'insert every day hero' type guy with nothing to make him pop. The action scenes did nothing for me.

I tried three separate times. Finally throwing in the towel. Sorry.

‘The Extinction Agenda’ by Michael Laurence published Sept 3rd by St Martins Press

377 Kindle Flix

Detailed detail!
If you like a full on adventure book absolutely brimming with facts, figures, history, political reference, bloodline explanation,weaponry evaluation, synopsis of past world events and speculation as to heat really happened all mixed in with a lead guy whose mission it is to save the planet from a powerful organisation, (so powerful they are unknown to mere mortals) who want to stop and decimate world population by unleashing a terrible virus...then this is a book for you, if not then it really isent as this book does the above well and is singular in its delivery of producing what it set out to do
The author must be praised for his in depth research which is mind blowing however doesn’t suit a quick chapter read here and there
Taking of chapters its very similar to
‘24’ where each ends on a ‘cliffhanger’ immediately then carried on in the next, worked well
The characters are almost superfluous to the story tbh but where they do come into play they are easyish to connect to and there is some humour in dialogue between them
Some of the descriptions are horrific, not in writing style which remains excellent throughout, but in what the virus does to the poor folk affected
This is Book 1 ( I am presuming ) in a series and will definitely read follow on books
Would make a great film
As with all books/tv like this you have to give some licence in how the hero survives etc
Not for all I am sure but for the sheer detail and adventure am giving it
9/10
5 Stars

I'm rating The Extinction Agenda 1.5 stars rounded up to two stars.

Action - check. Evil people taking advantage of the poor for their own purposes - check. A cast of thousands (sometimes seems like it) - check. A scary scenario - check plus! Conspiracy theory - check.

With all those boxes checked, why didn't I enjoy the book? I'll tell you why - believability. Not that the chosen extinction method isn't plausible - it is; horrifically so. But the main character isn't. If there's one thing I want in a good book, it's a believable and/or relatable main character and James Mason is not. He would have to exceed all the superpowers of every superhero to go through what he, mere mortal, goes through in this book. That's where the author lost me.

In addition, I can get by with not liking characters, I expect NOT to like all characters. But I hope that I at least care what happens to them. After seemingly throwing everything he could think of into the book, the results (in my humble opinion) was a huge mess. Sometimes less is more. I wish I had spent less of my time on this book.

My thanks to NetGalley and to St. Martin's Press for allowing me the opportunity to read and review an ARC of this book in exchange for an unbiased review. All opinions expressed here are my own.

Laurence sets the Extinction Agenda to a deadly virus! Who is behind it and how far up the political ladder does it climb to achieve the ---- MONEY of course? First pages of this work were full of an alphabet soup of listed organizations that were not tasty at all to me. Main FBI Agent Mason's character does meet up with some good (or bad sometimes) A-team members Gunnar and Rames. These two add much to the action of this thriller. This might play out better on the screen where the impossible happens and the bullets fly just missing the mark. "A copy of this book was provided by St. Martin's Press via Netgalley with no requirements for a review. Comments here are my honest opinion." Do Not Think I will be in on the NEXT AGENDA; this was just not for me.

Review by 2shay……….

If you’re reading this review on Amazon or Goodreads, you don’t know that along with 5 Stars, I also gave it 5 Thumbs Up! This book has everything a great thriller should have. Non-stop, heart pounding action, conspiracies, betrayals and a protagonist who is hell-bent on avenging his partner and his wife.

FBI Special Agent James Mason and his team walk straight into a trap while trying to apprehend a human trafficking ring in Arizona. James makes a split-second decision to save his partner that back-fires. James is badly injured and his partner is gone in an inferno that wipes out most of the team. He saw awful things in the few seconds before his world turned black, things that convince him that there is more at stake than human trafficking.

James has a difficult time processing what happened to his partner, his team and the terrible things he saw in Arizona. It left him distant from his wife and his new partner. IRS Agent Angie Thornton Mason, James’s wife, is killed in a seedy hotel with another man before James has a chance to close the widening gap between them and make things right with the woman he loves.

If it’s possible for a thriller to be perfect, this book is it. My congratulations to Mr. Laurence for this extraordinarily well-written novel. I’m looking forward to much more in what promises to be one of the best series to hit the shelves since Jack Reacher! Grab a copy and…

Enjoy!

ARC graciously provided by St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for an honest and voluntary review.

I received this copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts are my own.
Ok, so where do I begin? When I requested the book, I had extremely high hopes for it. The premise was good, the hero sounded like a man with a mission and it seemed to have enough thrills that I would enthralled to last the duration of the story in complete rapture. Unfortunately, no such luck. I don’t enjoy negatively reviewing books, but this really wasn’t my thing, it was a hard limit.

I’ve read books like these before and from just reading the synopsis, I had envisioned a Jack Reacher style plot. It just fell flat. You had all the key elements of an outstanding thriller – broken hero in the market for revenge, conspiracy and pseudo-science. Should have been quite literally fool-proof, the cover and the synopsis really did cover up a multitude of sins. The first chapter did lay the foundation relatively well – credit where its due. However, our PTSD suffering hero seemed to have the personality of a wet weekend and had zero relatable qualities that made me gravitate towards even remotely liking him. I felt nothing for him, nothing, nada. For me to connect to a story, I need to connect to the characters and just felt that his dialogue was extremely wooden. I often found myself skimming sections of chapters which then increased to skimming chapters because the author seemed to overuse exposition a lot. Chapters were overflowing with explanations for no other reasons than filling the page, or at least that’s how it seemed. I had hoped that the supporting characters would provide some edginess or humour to the dialogues but that failed to materialise also.

The thriller part wasn’t too thrilling. There was no mystery, no suspense and it was mainly just cut and dry, I would have loved to have some whacky red herring thrown into the mix, but it just left me feeling, well, meh. Not at all what you want in a Thriller novel. I think overall it just wasn’t my cup of tea. I like to be shocked, entertained and thrilled. None of it hit the mark and I wouldn’t find myself recommending this book.

I really looked forward to reading this book because of the link to the medical profession. This
.is book is truly a great thriller with a little more dead people than medical information but I did love it. The main character is a bad ass FBI agent who with his team goes to the desert to discover that there were multiple communal grave with disease ridden ridden corpse's . However, as they continue to search for who, and why these people died his team was ambushed and almost everyone was killed. Determined to stop this threat, Mason continues pursuing the people responsible for bringing illegal aliens across the boarder just to be given this lethal concoction. However, once again his team was ambushed and the majority of them were also killed, Mason promises he will get to end of this and quits his FBI job to be able to continue pursue this horrible group. I look forward to reading the next edition of this thrilling story.

Ooooo The Extinction Agenda is just a little bit too realistic to not get into. This story is a possibility in the world we live in. Reminded me a lot of James Rollins.

After discovering the disease-ridden corpses of a spate of illegal immigrants, FBI Special Agent James Mason find himself chasing down an unrepentantly evil adversary hellbent on the extermination of billions of human beings. Over the course of his investigation, Mason uncovers an elaborate generations-long conspiracy that has wound through history for more than a hundred years and is responsible for some of the world’s deadliest outbreaks. On the run and unsure of who he can trust, Mason vows to destroy the secret organization responsible for the deaths of so many before they can annihilate mankind.

Although The Extinction Agenda sounds like a blistering thriller in the mold of James Rollins or Jonathan Maberry’s Joe Ledger books, Michael Laurence takes an unexpected and much welcomed approach by casting his paranoid, conspiracy-driven plot as an investigative procedural. Think The X-Files by way of Michael Connelly. It’s a nifty change of pace, but I suspect some readers will find it an unforgivable bit of bait-and-switch. However, I found it to be a refreshing switch from the usual, tried-and-true run-and-gun, non-stop action formula thrillers of this type tend to go for. Instead, The Extinction Agenda relies more on intelligently twisted machinations and a smart conspiracy that slowly unravels over the evolution of Mason’s investigation.

While it’s intelligently crafted and Laurence knows how to build up a wonderful amount of suspense and paranoia, The Extinction Agenda also relies on some notable mystery-thriller cliches. Mason grows into the beleaguered and tortured protagonist that’s oh so common to the genre, leading him to go rogue from the Bureau and defy his superior’s commands, right down to the well-worn trope of getting suspended and turning in his badge and gun. It’s the sort of scene we’ve seen in a thousand cop movies and have read in just as many cop books. Laurence then props Mason up with a few conveniences, like his best boarding school buds who have just so happened to rise to the top of their respective fields and can provide him with all the necessary intel and weaponry he needs to get the job done. While Gunnar and Ramses make for interesting allies, they also make for some easy contrivances to get the disgraced FBI agent access to all the things he’s lost alongside his badge and status. And speaking of status, Mason just so happens to come from moneyed elite — his wife’s family is Big Money in the agricultural business and his father is a potential presidential candidate on the rise. Mason and his ad hoc team all enjoy certain levels of wealth and privilege and, frankly, given today’s political climate it’s a bit difficult for me to get all that invested in a ‘rich white guy fights to save the world’ shtick.

To his credit, Laurence does try to make Mason the underdog and at times it even works thanks to the breadth and depth of the New World Order conspiracy he finds himself embroiled in. The Extinction Agenda works best when we’re learning about the various levels of corruption and evil driving global events behind the scenes and what Mason’s current investigation means for the fate of the world. A good conspiracy is elaborate and complex, operates entirely in the shadows unseen by the world at large, oftentimes with evil intent or perhaps even apocalyptic repercussions, and is chillingly plausible. Well good lord, does Laurence ever deliver on all this in spades! The wider machinations surrounding this procedural bio-thriller are scarily possible and enough to make you paranoid if you’re not already. It’s also a pretty timely thriller given its focus on kidnapping and using illegal Mexican immigrants as a source of human experimentation for science run amok. As foreign children die in American concentration camps run by private for-profit groups that have donated large amounts of money to the current administration or are cycled through state-sponsored kidnapping via government-contracted foster care services linked to members of the current administration, it’s hard to look at Laurence’s connecting of dots and not find some measure of awful plausibility in the overarching conspiracy he presents. It may be improbable, but that certainly doesn’t make it impossible, particularly in light of the current state of the world.

Ultimately, The Extinction Agenda is a rich conspiracy thriller, and although it has its fair share of action throughout its 400 pages, it largely relies more on brains than brawn to win the day.

This is the most intense thriller I have read recently. It is extremely realistic, and it illuminates the exact state of affairs in America. Much of the story concerns a beleaguered FBI agent who is involved in a shootout where his partner is killed. He feels guilty about his partner's death, and that colors his entire life. His nemesis is a seemingly ageless Nazi with piercing blue eyes. A very diverse and unique group joins him to fight to save the world from a doomsday disease. Few of the characters are what they seem to be, and the tables keep turning as high tech weaponry and corruption in high places make it seem that the good guys cannot win. I definitely recommend reading this book for a thrilling and thought-provoking adventure.

This book overall is okay, but not a can't put down book. The plotline of the book is close to being believeable, although still a bit of a stretch. The main character is what makes this book less than it could have been. A number of the situations that he gets into require more of the super hero qualities than you normal human hero. A number of reviewers rated this book much higher so I will not recommend it, but be forewarned that it takes a major stretch of the imagination to make it believeable.

I received a free Kindle ARC courtesy of Net Galley and the publisher. It was with the understanding that I would provide an honest review and post it on Net Galley, Goodreads, Amazon and my review blog. I also posted it to my Facebook page.

This is a story that is both exciting and terrifying in its execution. Special Agent James Mason is part of a specialized strike force with the FBI. His team is called into a remote section of the Arizona desert where collections of dead scavenging birds have shown up and appear to have died after consuming tainted meat. The desert is known to be a wasteland through which migrants are known to pass. While no bodies are recovered, there is suspicion that someone injected a collection of migrants with a deadly communicable disease and then collected the bodies as they died. When tests confirmed a deadly avian flu in all the dead birds, the immediate concern is that someone is using immigrants to carry a weaponized biological agent into the country.

Mason’s team gets a possible lead on the people who may be behind the coup. They discover too late that they were set up, and Mason loses his partner and most of his team when the building they storm into explodes. Mason vows that he will get revenge for his fallen comrades and he commits himself to solving the case and avenging his fallen mentor and partner. This is a very twisty tale and it gets more complicated and shocking as it goes on. Nothing is what it appears to be in this story and the story is full of plenty of real world parallels that should be realistic enough to get anybody good and scared. This is book one and I look forward to more books in the series.

I did not read the first book, but I feel that this book would be a satisfying conclusion. How aliens might take over the world could be the subtitle. Thankfully, these characters figured out how to stop that from happening. As usual, the government was less helpful than one would hope...but one man managed to get the job done with the help of some friends.

This book was a really good edge-on-my-seat book and was very awesome! I did like the Resident Evil aspect of this book and how the odds stacked against these characters as I kept on reading.

FBI Special Agent James Mason barely survives a raid to capture the group helping to smuggle illegal aliens across the US border. Mason's recovery is slow going from the psychological aspect and this has an impact on his marriage as well as his job. Being one who seems to leap first and figure out a plan later Mason has gotten on the bad side of his FBI boss and has to surrender his badge and weapon for some forced time away from the case. Instead of slowing down Mason enlists the help of two of his friends to figure out what kind of bio-terrorism is facing the United States and probably the rest of the world.

This debut novel from Michael Laurence certainly doesn't read like a first attempt at writing a book. This one is polished from page one and grips the reader so tightly there is no getting away. There are a lot of characters introduced but don't become attached to any of them because they won't all be left standing by the time a resolution is reached. This is fast action on steroids and if you want your thriller novels to proceed a little slower you are flat out of luck. Bio-terrorism is the form of destruction I think would be most successful so this story made me uneasy. I was even more uneasy reading the portions of the story dealing with the degrading corpses and there are a lot of those situations. Make sure you are ready for some intensely gruesome descriptions in this novel. A well written story, but those scenes with the bodies will stay with me longer than I would like.

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for an e-Galley of this novel.

This was an extraordinary book, full of everything that makes a thriller fun for me - conspiracy, bioterrorism, shadow governments, one guy who figures it all out then assembles a team of good bad guys to help him resolve it... It reminded me a little of the Dean Koontz Jane Hawk series - not in any derivative way AT ALL, but because it's another story in which one good (with just enough street cred to know the right bad guys to help) guy finds himself enmeshed in something huge and scary and world-altering and uses his considerable wiles to save the day. The writing is great - perfectly paced, elegantly plotted and full of characters that leap off the page and grab you by the throat. My only complaint is that it ended - seriously, I could have read another thousand pages without blinking an eye... It ends on a great note - setting up the next book with plenty still on the table but nothing dangling off in a way that felt abrupt or unfinished. There's a lot more to this story, as hinted both throughout and at the end, and I for one cannot WAIT to see how it plays out!

This review will run on my blog (www.Jill-Elizabeth.com) in Summer 2019.

This is a very entertaining paranoid thriller, with a few good men (and women) battling a shadowy group intent on taking over the world via a truly apocalyptic scheme. After the initial exposition and character introductions, the action is pretty much nonstop, with enough plot twists to keep the reader guessing.

The main characters are likable. They're the kind of hard-bitten men of action who would never let a little thing like the end of the world interfere with their banter, and that's fine in this kind of book.

I will read the additional books in the series

Of all the threats that Americans might face from terrorists, a biological weapon might be the scariest. When evidence surfaces that a highly contagious virus has made it across the Mexican-American border into the U.S., FBI Agent James Mason leads a strike force on what is believed to be the origination point. To there surprise, they were expected and most of the team is killed in the devastating explosion that follows. Determined to stop this threat, Mason continues pursuing the people responsible. The only question that remains is what price will Mason pay in the process?

The Extinction Agenda by Michael Laurence is a stand-alone novel that features terrorists with a bio-weapon as the central plot point. While I enjoyed the book, I think it could have benefited from a prologue introducing the reader to the shadowy figure that figures prominently in the book. He just shows up without any real introduction. That said, the plot was realistic without getting bogged down in scientific jargon and their was quite a bit of action. I did enjoy the novel, which is why it gets 3/5 stars from me.

* A copy of the ebook was the only compensation received in exchange for this review. *