Mike Dellosso: Kill Devil

By Kelly Bridgewater

Jed Patrick is convinced he’s doing all it takes to keep his family safe―new names, new location, new identity. But just when he thinks he finally has his life back, trained men claiming to be CIA agents break in and threaten his wife and daughter, proving once and for all his family will never truly be safe until he eliminates the agency dead set on hunting him down.

Not knowing if Karen and Lilly are better off by his side or in hiding, Jed is determined to protect them while finding a way to use the classified information that he possesses to dismantle the Centralia Project. But he soon learns that eliminating Centralia may require compromising his own values. As danger escalates, Jed isn’t sure whether there’s anyone or anything he can trust―including his own senses.

From Amazon

 

My Thoughts: 

I enjoy stories and movies that are fast paced and non-stop action, so when I heard about Centralia, I couldn't wait to read it. Centralia has ever thing I liked in thriller. Characters I cared about, running from danger, and the threat of impending doom. So I expected the same thing with Kill Devil, the second installment of the Jed Patrick series. While it does feature non-stop action, this one didn't grab my attention as much.

First, I was dropped right back into Jed Patrick's run from the government with his wife, Karen, and daughter, Lily in the first chapter. As the story progressed, I actually found moments that I wanted to put the book down. Not that the action didn't stop, but it felt forced. What I mean is that it seems Dellosso tried to put Jed through everything horrible over and over, but it wasn't necessary for that many bad things to happen in such a short time. Even watching the Bourne or Fast and Furious movies, there was moment of breaks. Dellosso didn't include many.

Jed Patrick in the second installment seemed more of a cardboard character. In the first one, his motivation was to save his wife and daughter. In this book, Jed believes his wife is with him without any question even though he told his wife to run away to a safe place right after a bad incident. He still worried about his daughter, but it didn't seem top priority for him.

Kill Devil is a fast, paced original yet predictable, to me, novel. There is a number of settings because of the nature of the story, so it was not a setting that could relate and feel comfortable in. The writing is top notch. I had no problem following Jed Patrick on his run to save his daughter.

Fans of the Bourne Identity and the Fast and Furious will enjoy Mike Dellosso's newest installment of the Jed Patrick series. With non-stop action and a race to create treason, Jed Patrick creates a moving target of how much your memory can hold.

I received a complimentary copy of Kill Devil from Tyndale Publishing and the opinions stated are all my own.

My Rating:  3.5 out of 5 Stars

Do you like the Bourne movies? What aspect of the stories appeal to you and draw you into the movies? If not, what keeps you from watching thme?

Q and A with Mike Dellosso:

1. Kill Devil is the sequel to Centralia. How are the two books

connected?

First and foremost, they are connected by Jed Patrick and his family.

Kill Devil picks up where Centralia left off. With the conclusion of

Centralia, we left Jed and Karen and Lilly headed to Idaho where they would assume new identities and a new life far from any government agency’s reach or knowledge. They would become obscure and live in safety, albeit secluded. But somehow, some way, they are found

and in Kill Devil we see the results of that. There is also a continuation of the story behind the Centralia project, a ghost agency buried deep within the labyrinth of Washington politics. Jed is still battling this foe and continues to battle the enemy within himself as well, his memories and mysterious past.

2. How did you come up with the concept for the Jed Patrick series?

From Mike Dellosso

It started with my obsession with the Jason Bourne series and character. I love the whole concept. I’ve also been interested in government conspiracy theories, cover-ups, black-ops, that whole sort of “underworld” that exists in the shadows. I’m also quite a family man. So that got me thinking about what it could look like if those two worlds collided. What if a family man discovers that he has a past he has no memory

of and that the mysterious past involved conspiracy, cover-ups, black-ops and him being a super soldier? Then to top it off I wanted to put a unique spin on it and infuse elements of faith into the story. That alone set the concept apart and opened a whole new world of possibilities for the storyline.

3. You don’t shy away from violence in your novels. How do you handle

writing those situations as a Christian author?

I handle them carefully. I know it may not seem like it to some readers but I do put a lot of thought into how I handle violence in my books. I want the reader to feel the gravity of the situation, the intensity of the moment, but I need to draw the line onhow much I describe and finding where that line should be is a challenge at times. I’m sure I’ve crossed the line at times for some readers but for me, I’m careful to stay on the side that gives the reader the information he or she needs without glorifying the violence or glamorizing it.

4.What role does faith play in the lives of some of the main characters—

Jed, his wife Karen, daughter Lilly, Tiffany, and Jack?

Faith plays a huge role in all of their lives. In spite of everything they’ve been through, especially Jed with all the brainwashing and torture, their relationship with God has remained the one thing that has gone unchanged. Yes, Jed doubts it at times and had to rediscover it totally, but if there is one ribbon of hope that runs through their lives, it’s faith. Lilly’s faith is the strongest of the three of them, so childlike and unwavering. Jed draws strength from her and in Kill Devil learns that he needs to

make her faith his own, he needs to stop channeling strength through her and find his own very real connection with God. Like all of us, their faith development and maturity is a journey with ups and downs and setbacks and growth spurts, but they move forward, learning more, discovering more, and being challenged more and more to simply trust.

5.  What is next for you, writing-wise?

I have some ideas for a third Jed Patrick novel and am bouncing them around to see which one fits best. I also have an idea for a stand-alone thriller. Other than that I’ve written a couple short stories featuring Jed Patrick and a bunch of articles and guest posts to promote Kill Devil.

Thanks for sharing, Mike Dellosso! Below I have included the book trailer for Kill Devil. I hope it wets your appetite for the book. Enjoy!