Review of The Date Farm

[Joseph Dunn]

[Following is a volunteer review of "The Date Farm" by Jack Winnick.]

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4 out of 4 stars

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A terror attack in Los Angeles has ties to a heist in New York City. Technology located thousands of miles away in the Middle East is instrumental in orchestrating the events, both of which are distractions to cover the actual objective. The Date Farm by Jack Winnick is an international thriller with action spanning the globe. Tensions are high, and suspense is prevalent in this fourth installment in the Lara and Uri series. On this fast-paced journey, Lara and Uri experience several risky situations that leave readers on the edge of their seats. In one scenario, the couple is used as bait to draw out the mastermind behind the two major attacks in this book. Laura and Uri encounter this character in a previous book; however, I did not feel lost even though this is the first book I have read in the series. Because of their backgrounds, Laura and Uri also act as undercover agents in Iran; their objective is to gather intelligence to help the U.S. reacquire the valuable assets stolen in the New York heist. The antagonists capture the couple on two separate occasions, and Laura and Uri must orchestrate daring escapes.

The amount of detail in The Date Farm creates a vivid picture of each setting and activity in the book. While the story is set across the globe, the author does an amazing job of describing each location, so it felt as if I traveled to each scene. Also, the author’s knowledge of the Iranian geographical and political landscapes is apparent; I found myself researching as I read, and even though this story is fictional, I learned a good deal about places in the Middle East such as Incirlik, Kazerun, and Tehran. The author provides such great detail on U.S military operations, I felt I was a part of the action.

As far as negative aspects are concerned, I appreciate seeing the terrorists’ perspectives, but I felt those characters were a bit monolithic. There were opportunities to provide insight into what motivated certain characters to hate western culture, particularly the double-agent; however, I left the story only with a perception that all Iranians hate America and Israel. With the level of detail provided throughout the book, I had hoped the antagonists would have a little more depth and dimensionality.

Also, there were occasions where I felt Laura and Uri were too flippant despite the gravity surrounding their circumstances. During one of the hostage scenes, Uri does a Bogart imitation while he and Lara were still in great danger. Shortly after this, Lara says to Uri that captors ran “like a Roadrunner cartoon.” While these scenes were not egregious, their lives were at stake, and their words did not match the tension in the scene. It almost felt that escaping was a bit too easy for this pair.

Despite my criticisms, I rate the book four out of four stars. There were a few punctuation errors, but not so many to affect my rating.
This book whips around the world, and on a few occasions, there are flashbacks to previous stories, but the action is easy to track. Even though this is the first book I have read in the series, I never felt lost.

I recommend this book to anyone who enjoys thrillers, particularly those involving military action. The book comes across as unsympathetic to Islam, and Islamic characters are portrayed one-dimensionally, so Muslim readers should be aware of this.

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The Date Farm
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[Janet Alex]

I agree with you on this 'Terrorism attacks have been a major form of violence that negatively affects society. Such attacks should be prevented by all means possible in order to protect lives and properties.' This is also why I appreciated Lara and Uri's work.