Hard Landing (The Spider Shepherd Thrillers Book 1) by Stephen Leather (Epub)

Description

But when a powerful drugs baron starts to kill off witnesses to his crimes, Shepherd is given his most dangerous assignment yet. He has to go undercover in a top security prison, a world where one wrong move will mean certain death.

As Shepherd gambles everything to move in on his quarry, he soon realises that the man he is hunting is even more dangerous than the police realise. And that he is capable of striking outside the prison walls and hitting Shepherd where it hurts most.

User’s Reviews

Review A taut-page turner, it gives fascinating insight into life behind bars.―Daily ExpressLet Spider draw you into his web, you won’t regret it.―SunAs tough as British thrillers get, Hard Landing is a gripping and enjoyable read.―Irish Independent –This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

Reviews from Amazon users, collected at the time the book is getting published on UniedVRG. It can be related to shiping or paper quality instead of the book content:

⭐ SPOILER ALERT – REVIEW FOR THOSE WHO HAVE READ THE BOOK.Too many unbelievable plot premises. Why bother to hold on to prosecuting Carpenter the imprisoned drug king for smuggling and money laundering when there is already clear evidence that he is ordering from prison witnesses to his crimes to be killed, tampering with state evidence, and threatening the key witness Roper against him? These alone would guarantee a life sentence, yet the book pretends that the only way to nail him is to have undercover Spider Shepard (Bob Macdonald) plod along to get him to confess to his original drug crimes.If it is already known that Carpenter is killing off witnesses through getting messages out of the prison to his underlings, why wouldn’t he be immediately isolated and held in solitary confinement in some secure place where he couldn’t order witness’ deaths? Yet he’s unbelievably allowed to carry on going to the prison gym, receiving mail, etc. etc. and keeping other privileges as though there are no consequences to his killing off the state’s witnesses, etc. to destroy the case against him. Well, guess what? His doing so would lead to consequences in any believable story, including being prosecuted for subverting justice. But apparently not in Hard Landing.And why would Shepard’s police handlers believe his cochamany story about the IRA busting into this maximum security prison to free both him and Carpenter? Why would Carpenter want to free him??? Or the IRA??? This is beyond unbelievable and makes absolutely no sense. Reading the book any further after this crazy explanation given by Shepard to his handler Hargrove after he escapes the prison is asking the reader to abandon any and all common sense.

⭐ Lucky me – I never been jailed and never had any problems with the law anywhere, so at first I was mildly curious about life of inmates in the UK high-security prison.The idea in Hard Landing of Stephen Leather is not that bad – the undercover cop is placed in jail to collect incriminating evidence against the drug lord who is locked up in the same jail waiting for his trial and ordering execution of all witnesses on the outside.Unfortunately, with the exception of a few interesting moments – I am not counting the funny storming of that high-security jail,of course! -the book is very much the diary of inmates everyday boring activities, including the detailed menu of their breakfast,lunch and dinner.Not much action in the book, the main hero Shepherd makes some clumsy and unsuccessful attempts to approach and befriend the drug dealer, however he fails wasting his time in that miserable jail as I wasted my time reading that book.

⭐ But the action is very well described but with less detail than is devoted on how prisoners move from their cells to the exercise yard. There is also some real tension but it is based on whether the bad guys will hurt some family members, a plot device I really detest. There is an imbalance in the narrative weight, inconsequential scenes are long and detailed and action scenes are rushed with many of the details glossed. But Spider is an interesting protagonist and I have enjoyed other of Leather’s works so I will give the next book in this series a go.

⭐ HARD LANDING was the first in the Stephen Leather’s series of thrillers starring Dan “Spider” Shepherd, an ex-SAS trooper now assigned to an elite Metropolitan police unit tabbed for deep undercover operations when the usual enforcement methods can’t nab the bad guys. Dan’s nickname came to be while on an SAS survival training mission and he won a bet on who could eat the most disgusting thing. One normally doesn’t see “tarantula” on the menu even in the greasiest curry house.HARD LANDING was followed by Soft Target and Cold Kill (Dan Shepherd Mysteries) , all three of which I’ve unintentionally read in reverse order. I’d recommend reading the first book first since, if nothing else, the series is a character development exercise for the protagonist.Here, Spider is tossed into one of Her Majesty’s maximum security prisons after establishing his cover as an armed desperado on an airport warehouse hold-up gone bad. Dan’s mission is to nail big-time drug trafficker Gerald Carpenter, currently in the same lock-up awaiting trial. Carpenter is somehow communicating with the outside and masterminding the quashing of evidence and killing of witnesses that would otherwise convict him. Fearing Gerald will ultimately go free, Shepherd’s job is to identify the leak and thus ensure Carpenter’s conviction.Spider’s job prevents him from having a normal home life with his wife Sue and son Liam, a fact that causes the inevitable friction with the former and neglect of the latter and which is exacerbated by a tragedy that occurs while Dan is behind bars. I previously mentioned in my review of SOFT TARGET (dated 11/4/06 and entitled “A whopping cell phone bill, no doubt”) that the author perhaps dwelled too much on Spider’s spotty relationship with his son, which caused me to knock off a star from that otherwise splendid tale. With Shepherd, I’m looking for hard-boiled action not agonized soul-searching. (My other favorite fictional Tough Guy, Lee Child’s Jack Reacher, never ever moons about engaging in self-castigating guilt trips.) I gave COLD KILL five stars (dated 6/29 06 and entitled “How hardball do we play it?”) because it maximized the action and minimized the hand-wringing, and I’m giving HARD LANDING a full allocation of points for the same reason.Until commencing with the Dan Shepherd series, Leather had pretty much eschewed an ongoing hero beyond a couple of books. With Spider, Stephen has struck gold, and I’m eagerly awaiting the fourth installment, HOT BLOOD.

⭐ I didn’t understand half of the colloquialisms, had to stop an figure them out. At times it Brooke up my reading pace. That being said, was fairly decent book. Premise was difficult , but on the whole believeable. I suspect the next one will be a bit easier to read for me, so yes – I’m going to to read another one. On the whole, it was entertaining just not engrossing.

⭐ Decided to give an author I’m not familiar with a try. I wasn’t disappointed. The characters were believable and the plot drew me in after just a few pages. I enjoyed this book enough to order the second one in the series.

⭐ This book of Mr Leathers is a typically masterful work that commences with intrigue and sustains, and even builds up more tension, as the characters are continually developed by a master of the genre.The plotting is so unforeseeable (at least for me) that I felt like I was being taken on a journey on a train that was running of a the top of a high plateau, but even believing that to be true, II could not get off!.Do not expect to be able to put it down easily or for long.

⭐ This novel was my introduction to the works of Stephen Leather and I’ll definitely be reading more. Going undercover in prison is no walk in the park but Spider Shepherd does it well and realistically, all while juggling a family tragedy. Superb writing, gritty and real. If you haven’t read Stephen Leather yet do yourself a favor and get this book. You can thank me later.I’ve already purchased more Spider Shepherd thrillers.

⭐ After reading The Chinaman which I liked for its fast pace and good dialogue, I had to put this down after about half the book. Too slow, very bad dialogue. Stopped buying his books.

⭐ Just a great thriller! If you enjoy thrillers you will enjoy this. 20 words or more is a ridiculous requirement

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