Here’s the concept: A burned CIA agent, now hunted by his old bosses, meets a computer genius. The genius tells him he’s found a way to hack into police and security databases, to identify ordinary people who are under threat. He needs an agent to intervene and protect those people. He has almost unlimited funds to set them up in the hero business.

If you think this sounds like the old Jim Caviezel TV show, Person of Interest, that’s how it sounds to me too. The main difference is that The Silencer is set in Philadelphia. Our hero takes the name of Mike Recker, and eases into his new life. Soon he will have his hands full, and will begin to make his first human connections after a long personal drought.

Aside from the un-original concept, I found the story in The Silencer entertaining in itself. (One thing that annoyed me was that our hero, supposedly a master of covert operations, loses no time in making himself a public legend. He might at least have varied his costumes, instead of allowing himself to be identified in the papers as “the man in the trench coat.” That’s not keeping a low profile).

But the biggest problem with this book was the author’s weak grasp of English grammar. He’s constantly dropping howlers like, “But things rarely go as planned, don’t they?” And, “There was maps of the area on a wall….” This author needs an editor. Badly.

Light-weight, derivative entertainment, marred by clumsy writing. You might enjoy the book, if you’re less picky than I am.