'The Gray Man' by Mark Greaney

The Gray Man, Mark Greaney (3.0)

Spy stories can vary in terms of action, violence, skills, gadgets and spy-craft, which ultimately determine believability. Having watched the new movie based on this series, I was expecting a lot of action and violence. This was certainly the case – and the skills were so over the top that one’s skepticism needed to be suspended throughout the read (can someone with a deep stomach knife wound really keep assaulting others for hours?). I’m not giving away much as the front cover indicated this was ‘Gray Man 1’ so it was more curiosity to see how someone would survive the onslaught of 100 assassins after him. I could somewhat overlook the unbelievability, given the genre, but about 60% into the book more information is given about the motive of the bad guys and the whole plot falls apart - the reason for all the action becomes contrived.