To Kill a President: An international assassination thriller by Mike Spence (2023) Review

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Should have used an exploding cigar.

To Kill a President: An international assassination thriller by Mike Spence (2023): 5 out of 10: A group of Healthcare CEO’s hire assassins to kill President Clinton. Can counter terrorist forces stop them in time? We will find out.

The Good

The Good: This is Mike Spence’s first book and you know what? He wrote and published a book. Good for him and congrats. Not a simple task.

Plus, Mike took up a fairly hard genre. There is one reason that there are a lot more indie Anne Rice style books than indie Tom Clancy style books. Writing a Tom Clancy style thriller is very hard.

Setting the thriller thirty years in the past when, for the reader, the outcome is a forgone conclusion “Spoiler Alert, the assassins will not successfully kill President Clinton”, adds additional challenge.

I do not hate “To Kill a President” by any means. It is breezy and the numerous security meetings are well rendered. There is some nice detail that is fun and the author clearly did some research.

The Bad

The Bad: Not painful to read is a good starting point for any book. Unable to figure out who the protagonists are supposed to be halfway through on the other hand…

A “story structure” refers to the underlying framework of a narrative, outlining the order of events, including the introduction of characters and setting (exposition), rising conflict (rising action), the turning point of highest tension (climax), the events leading to resolution (falling action), and the final resolution of the conflict (resolution), essentially acting as a blueprint for how a story unfolds. 

To Kill a President will teach any budding novelist a lot about story structure. Mainly by its absence. There is no lack of ham fisted exposition dumping mind you, but alas, much of it is for characters that are not involved in the plot till the book is two-thirds done.

To Kill a President has its initial focus on an assassination attempt in Malaysia. Only issue is the characters we are following are in New Zealand. So unfortunately, we know, seemingly before the author, that the Malaysia action is an extremely long red herring.

There are a lot of meetings in To Kill a President. I feel like I am sitting in on a bunch of Zoom calls, but I am not on the payroll. I am sure thier is an exciting novel or two about the adoption of new IT protocols for an event of this size and importance and nail biting meetings with treasury officials to meet the IT needs for security teams. But To Kill a President is not that novel.

I could recall none of the characters in To Kill a President at gunpoint. A cast of a dozen and none stick out. Even the two assassins are a bit underwhelming. There is no kick the dog moment from the bad guys and the good guys have no real stand out moments either. Slowing down and developing a character or two beyond what is on thier CV is certainly in order.

Picking at least one of the good guys to be the focus of the book is helpful before the halfway point.

The Ugly

The Ugly. We have two assassination attempts in To Kill a President. The first is foiled by pure dumb luck and a ridiculous level of coincidence. To the point I say in my reading notes below it was a “A wizard did it” copout.

I should have kept my powder dry because that was a swiss timepiece compared to the ridiculous ending. A wizard did it indeed.

Look, I know real life does not have to make logical sense. Any halfway detailed description of the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand is going to sound like a farfetched and not well thought out thriller. But fiction demands at least the opportunity for the reader to follow along and say how are they going to get out of this. If the answer is they can’t, but something magically happened off the page and all is better, there is going to be disappointment.

Also, having your conclusion be basically bad guy was struck by lighting and the day was saved makes me wonder why I had to sit through all those security meetings if none of the good guys in any way affected the plot.

In Conclusion. To Kill a President is a light, breezy read with some green shoots. Mike Spence’s first book has some nice bits and I don’t regret reading it. Hopefully, he can work on plot, characterization and for the love of God, story structure before taking on another project.

Random Notes from reading

Well, we start with a bit of an exposition dump. Not really that bad under the circumstances, for this so far is a Tom Clancy light style thriller. Seems like a half a dozen blokes from a New Zealand security detail in Vancouver for a conference and they get to experience an emergency landing in a helicopter. The emergency is over pretty quick with a little exposition and even less tension.

Apparently, they are at a security conference meeting, so I expect a detailed exposition of the breakfast buffet. I could not recall any of the characters introduced so far at gunpoint, but this is very early going indeed. Hardly a bad sign, but more of a middle of the road thriller so far.

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Holy exposition dump Batman… wait, we complained about that last time. Well, we are back and the good guys crew get their resumes read to us with one quirky fact thrown in. Bob loves hot peppers and speaking of hot peppers Lisa has a PHD in Boťany but is a computer genius from Auckland… You get the gist.

It is the two bad guy protagonists maybe that we get some actual story from. (The fact I am unsure who the actual protagonists are is a problem book) We have a meetup at a hotel pool and a very, very cliche dead hooker and Asian businessman plot. The assassination of the president at the APEC conference in Malaysia in 1998.

No, there is no time machine, silly. The book takes place in 1998. While my eyes are truly glossing over at the CV’s for the security team, the book is a bit of a page turner and I went a chapter or two more than I expected last night, which is a good sign. Not quite entertaining yet and not quite well written yet either, it still has potential. We shall see.

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Is there a hint of romance in the air… or is one guy creeping on the only female character? Tomato… Tomato…

I like the way the book realistically portrays meetings and how people are in thier own little world and concerned with their point of view. On the other hand, we are twenty-five percent of the way through I know none of the characters and I feel like I have been to a bunch of meetings about potential security procedures regarding an APEC conference in two years (from the point of view of the characters or twenty years ago from the point of view of the reader) not exactly riveting stuff.

So far, we have had an APEC conference in Vancouver where protestors blocked the road and some were teargassed. Some connection between student activists from Indonesia and the plot. A bunch of characters we really know little better than we did during the exposition dump of the first two chapters and some meeting complaining about the oversized security presence of the United States in one of these things.

I do not hate the book by any means it is breezy and the meetings are well rendered. It is lacking characterization and per my Kindle I am 25 percent of the way through and not much has happened. I am still unclear who or whom the main characters are supposed to be.

To add to the issues, I feel like I am sitting in on a bunch of Zoom calls, but I am not on the payroll. There seems to be a little characterization of the players on the good guy side despite the amount of real estate they have taken up so far in the book. The budding romance between one guy and the only girl is ham-fisted at best.

The author would have been better off focusing on one or two obvious protagonists.

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Well, on the plus side, it is getting better. We had two potential assassins, one a lady from Australia who was doing professional high stakes bodyguard work, the other a security chief in Indonesia for the failing Suharto regime. (the year once again is 1998).

He gets the job, and she doesn’t, but we get nice little asides on both, including thier ways of making sure they are undetected. The good guys fare less well. I am sure thier is an exciting novel or two about the adoption of new IT protocols for an event of this size and importance and nail biting meetings with treasury officials to meet the IT needs for security teams. But To Kill a President is not that novel so far.

I feel like I am sitting in on a bunch of Zoom calls, but I am not on the payroll, so I am not getting paid here. The bigger problem is that there seems to be a little characterization of the players on this side despite the amount of real estate they have taken up so far in the book. The budding romance between one guy and the only girl is ham-fisted at best.

The issue is not that the protagonist is uninteresting or hard to relate to. The problem is, I am a quarter of the way through the book and I do not know who the protagonist is supposed to be.

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Is the APEC meeting where this assassination (or bombing at this point) is supposed to take place in Malaysia or New Zealand? At this point, I am genuinely confused. My reading comprehension is not that bad, is it? Our potential hook up partners/lovebirds have finally hooked up in a tepid shower scene. Yay? Still unclear on a protagonist and now I have lost the plot regarding location.

On the plus side, since Mr. White or who ever our bad guy is supposed to be (Sly Spectre reference perhaps?) has chosen his assassin and our assassin has wasted little time kidnapping. families and getting potential suicide bombers. This results in a nice burst of action and a refreshing break from the zoom calls of the previous chapters.

One aside, the book does a decent background on countries and travelogue scenery. I would be remiss in not calling that out.

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Well, I read a chunk, and some things came into focus. The first attempt on the president was in Malaysia. It would fail, and the assassin dispatched. That is why Mr White or Mr Big or whatever still has a second assassin to hire. And that is why we have been following the security team for New Zealand and not Malaysia?

There are some fairly serious plot issues and confusions. First the confusion, I am pretty sure the love interest and the female assassin are not the same person. I am not a hundred percent sure. The bad guys turn out to be some old white CEOs of healthcare/ drug companies. Thier motive for killing President Clinton seems really weak.

The failure of the first assassin’s plot has more than a touch of a wizard did it around it. The son of security for the APEC event was friends of the girl kidnapped in Vancouver and witnessed the kidnapping and gave his father a description of the kidnapper, whom was recognized as an operative for Suharto and well let us just stick with a wizard did it.

By its nature, the failed attempt in Malaysia adds nothing,. One knew it was going to fail because we were only halfway through the book. And all the other characters in place are for the event next year, not this one. It honestly seems like unnecessary characters and more problematic, it is not all that interesting. The plan had some serious issues and the way it was prevented has some issues so serious. Well, see a wizard did it above.

The author is showing some talent for filling in local talent, and color though I would say at this time and place that fact that Air Force One is the designation for the plane the president is in and not a specific aircraft is not really a little known fact.

Usually at this point I would list the things I liked and thier are shadows are glimpses. It is not an unpleasant read, but there is much ado about nothing so far and the bad guy’s plot motive is lame and nonsensical. Almost headshaking so.

You know a lot of books start off with our protagonists being challenged. Very popular in action books (Think of the openings of almost every Bond film.) This is the genuine issue with this failed assassination. It has none of the players in the book. The assassin is going to be a different person. More importantly, the security team is a completely distinct set of folks. Hell, even Clinton is not there as the US sends Gore instead.

I am not saying the assassination is not interesting. But if you are writing The Natural, you don’t spend the first half of the book describing a Cubs’ game that took place a year before Roy Hobbs joined the league.

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A couple of more chapters and the plot (well at least the bad guys plan) comes a bit more in focus. She is travelling under two Ids one completely fabricated once she is in the country and the other “borrowed” from a real person who is unaware of the identity theft. The spy beating up her doppelgänger to the point of hospitalization seems a little unnecessary and high risk. Honestly, a simple B and E would have been sufficient, especially if all she is stealing is the passport. It could be months before someone notices it missing, let alone suspects it is stolen.

Speaking of strange relations, our other partner for our assassin seems just a flaky. A pilot that she is blackmailing because of a death/murder in Vancouver, which I assume is in the book and I just forgot about it? Anyway, he has I am a weak link ask me how written all over him. Considering he is smuggling in the stinger missile to be used against the president’s smaller aircraft flying from the major airport to the golf course resort, he is a bad guy to have as your bad guy. As plans go, the suicide bomber guy from earlier had a much better plan overall.

Our good guys, meanwhile, check out hotel suites like Phyllis Diller on tour.

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Well, we are almost at 75 percent and maybe it’s just me, but it seems our author has found a solid footing in the narrative. His description of the wayward pilot acquiring the Stinger missile in Afghanistan and smuggling it into both Australia and then New Zealand, followed up by his transfer to the assassin, has been flawless. In fact, all the other plotlines seem to have gained a maturity and gravitas with descriptions being more solid and the players in place. Looks like four stars are back on the menu if he can stick the landing.

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Short read, but the story is definitely coming together at the 80 percent mark. I do not know how our heroes are going to prevent the assassination attempt or even think it is in the cards. On the other hand, since the president in question is Clinton, I am afraid it takes a bit of tension out of the book. Alas, we know the assassin is not going to succeed, no matter how decent her plan is.

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Well, my last notes we prescient. How are the heroes going to figure it out? Well, have the bad guys be one of the security crew and then kill another of the security crew to help cover up something that really has not been discovered or even noticed. Then once attention is drawn, drive inexplicably to the wilderness area where the assassin lady with the stinger is getting ready top shoot down the president’s smaller plane.

Oh, and when even this breadcrumb trail seems not to work have a completely unrelated character boobie trap the Stinger missile months ago for a monetary payout (From who????) so when the trigger is puled the bad guys blow up.

Boo. Boo. Booooooo.

Look, one of the reasons that there are a lot more indie Anne Rice style books than indie Tom Clancey style books is writing a Tom Clancy style thriller is very, very hard. But come on. Certainly author Mike Spence had already written the ending before he got there organically through the writing process? I mean, really. A random person set a bomb is not really an ending to a thriller.

Look, I know real life does not have to make logical sense. Any halfway detailed description of the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand is going to sound like a farfetched and not well thought out thriller. But fiction demands at least the opportunity for the reader to follow along and say how are they going to get out of this. If the answer is they can’t, but something magically happened off the page and all is better, there is going to be disappointment. Once again, a wizard did it.

This is Mike Spence’s first book and you know what you wrote and published a book. Good for you and congrats. But Mike, that ending… Booooooo.

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