Product Description

In the Sultanate of Oman over two hundred hostages are being held at gunpoint. And the world watches helplessly as the madness begins. The spirit of the Mahdi is abroad, intent on complete financial and political domination. Evan Kendrick, a quiet Congressman, is an unlikely hero. But in his past is a violence that he cannot forget. On the other side of the world, five very eccentric, very rich people are meeting. They are the Inheritors of Inver Brass. Their aim - to utterly transform the world. They seek a new saviour, an innocent messiah. Evan Kendrick is to be their unwilling victim . . .

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #38577 in Books
• Published on: 2004-07-01
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 848 pages

About the Author
After a successful career in the theatre, Robert Ludlum launched his career as a bestselling writer with THE SCARLATTI INHERITANCE in 1971, the first of 22 consecutive international bestsellers. Robert sadly passed away in March 2001.

Customer Reviews

Icarus Agenda - Ludlum At His Best
This book combines the best of Ludlums key strengths as a writer; the ability to combine diverse plots into a single conclusion, repeated action scenes that keep readers glued to the pages and a well realised hero that can be identified with - i.e. more believable than the Cussler style of character. I've read pretty much all of the Ludlum novels and this one stands out as one of the very best - right up there with the Bourne trilogy. Buy this, it will not disappoint you.

Excellent beginning, but weakening towards the end
The Icarus Agenda is Robert Ludlum's second Inver Brass novel. But it is really two books in one with the first story being the more interesting of the two.

A terrorist grouping occupies the American embassy in the Sultanate of Oman and takes 200-odd hostages. The Americans appear to be helpless. Evan Kendrick, a quiet Congressman and unlikely hero, who just happens to have a lot of contacts in the region offers his aid to the US State Department and is duly send to Oman. And he does a fine job. You can read all the details in the Icarus Agenda. Robert Ludlum again does an excellent job here. All the necessary details are there. It's a very good story in its own right.

Enter 'book 2'. One year later, Inver Brass, a secretive group of high-minded and high-placed intellectuals, decides to place an individual close to the highest level of the US Government to transform (or maybe clean up) the political landscape. Evan Kendrick is again the unlikely hero, who finds himself being manipulated - and quite unwillingly so - into a higher political profile, which eventually leads him to become the Vice-presidential candidate. Again I will spare you the details, you can pick them up in the book. Besides, I could spend hundreds of pages describing the plots and twists and turns.

All these twists and turns are what really bothers me about the second part of the book. There are simply too many of them. At times you feel that the latest twist was merely added to add a few pages to the book. That part of the book loses focus because of it. Some more rationalisation of the story line would have added more quality to a book, which apart from that is a decent read.

One of his Best
If you thought that Ludlum would never better The Bourne Identity then you may be surprised. The Icarus Agenda has not only a plot that keeps getting more and more twisted as the story evolves but also it portarys a man that is charismatic enough to make the reader feel truly involved.

The story is, like with all Ludlum's books, a complicated mass of political and moral deceptions. But written masterly so that you're often be surprised at the new twist, yet never lost and confused by it. As always as unbelievable as the plot may seem it's also seems so feasible, as all Ludlum's book.

If, Like some have said, you believe the book has too many twist for you to follow, then perhaps you'd be better of reading a Colin Forbes novel...