Dead or Alive, by Tom Clancy

It's anybody's guess whether it's Clancy's or co-author Blackwood's fault, but I'll blame Clancy because his name is in the big font on the cover.  This book was poorly structured and resulted in a very boring read.  It started out well--just long enough to get me to buy it after reading the sample--but then it slowed down dramatically.  The main problem is that the reader doesn't even know what the book is really about until the 65% mark.  This first plot point should come at 20-25% into the book.

Having such a late start on the book messes everything up.  The first 65% was often boring because I didn't know why I should care about these characters, and I didn't know what the stakes were.  Cramming three quarters of the action into the last 35% of the pages also meant that the response, attack and resolution by the good guys was rushed and unsatisfying.

The book also suffered from too many sub-plots which weren't connected to the main story line and were not resolved in the end.  Why did we spend so much time on Ryan Senior deciding to run for president again if it didn't affect the resolution?  Are we supposed to read Clancy's next book to find out what happens?  If so, it's not going to work for this reader.

The characterization is also a problem.  Clancy clearly loves and knows these characters well.  The problem is that he doesn't spend much effort making us love and know them well.  This is a good thing to keep in mind as a writer, and is perhaps one pit-fall of writing novels with the same characters.