Crown Fire

Michael Nolan is a professor of English at the Memorial University of
Newfoundland.

David Annandale’s first novel has an adolescent mentality; it is a
graphic video game or action movie made word, or rather many, many
words. Jen Blaylock is ex-Canadian Forces, a killer in fatigues and a
short skirt who turns vigilante to avenge her murdered family. She goes
undercover, first duping and then partnering with a computer programmer
in Integrated Security, the global arms company she wishes to destroy.
The plot, which grows increasingly unbelievable, involves a Bondian plan
for world dominance, a maniacal supervillain, and a deadly G-8 meeting.

About 100 of the book’s 349 pages could easily have been cut. What
should be one sentence is frequently sliced into three. And while
individual scenes have suspense and colour, the style is overwrought:
there are too many metaphors and images. Also, there are just too many
action scenes—so many, in fact, that the novel almost becomes a parody
of an action thriller. The last fifth of Crown Fire is all
special-effects violence, an indulgence of death and bloodshed. Maturity
and a mercifully cruel editor may help next time.