That’s what the team hired to terminate her had reported, and that’s how her file had been marked.
Dead. Six years now.
So why did she suddenly show up on a hotel’s security camera in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania? Those who’d paid for her elimination are more than a little curious.
One person should know what happened—Jonathan Quinn, one of the best cleaners in the business, the man who’d been tasked with the disposal of her body.
Only Quinn isn’t exactly easy to get ahold of these days, and he may not be willing to share the answer.
Brett Battles is a NEW YORK TIMES bestselling and Barry Award-winning author of forty novels, including the Jonathan Quinn series and its Excoms spinoff, the Project Eden series, and the time bending Rewinder series. He’s also the coauthor, with Robert Gregory Browne, of the Alexandra Poe series. He is one of the founding members of Killer Year, and is a member of Mystery Writers of America and International Thriller Writers. He lives and writes in Ventura County, California.
This installment of Quinn did not disappoint! Great story well defined and an ending where the bad guys get their due! Enjoyed the addition of a new character, Daeng -- will be interesting to see if he is a recurring character in future stories! 8 out of 10.
In my last review of a Brett Battles novel (“The Collected,” published in October of 2012, and the seventh and penultimate [so far] entry in this series), I noted that Jonathan Quinn, the protagonist whose job it is to discreetly clean up crime scenes, remove bodies and get rid of nasty, incriminating stuff like blood, and his protégé, Nate, had become colleagues, rather than mentor and apprentice. In this, the sixth Quinn book, the reader finds out how that came about.
The tale opens in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, when a man keeps an appointment scheduled through an enigmatic e-mail from what is apparently a non-existent address. A fateful meeting it is, as the man soon falls [jumps? is pushed?] to his death just as he is about to keep his appointment with one Mila Voss, the person who is central to the fascinating plot fashioned here. [Note that this occurs on page 21 of the book, so no spoiler here.] When security cameras show a disguised but recognizable Mila rushing to the spot where the body landed, a furor is raised in “the secret world”: The woman was supposed to have been killed six years ago, and Quinn was the one tasked with disposing of the body, which he duly reported he had done. Conspiracies, corruption in high places, powerful men who will stop at nothing to achieve their goals, all combine to serve up another terrific thriller.
In addition to Tanzania, the story takes the reader to Stockholm, Sweden; Lucerne, Switzerland; London; Rome; Las Vegas; San Francisco; Atlanta, Georgia; Virginia; and, early on, to Bangkok, where Quinn took refuge nearly nine months prior following the events in the prior series entry. That self-banishment gave rise to Nate becoming “a full-fledged cleaner, running Quinn’s business on his own.” As Quinn notes when Nate succeeds in tracking him down, “There was something older about Nate, his edges sharper and more defined. There was a confidence, too. While Nate undoubtedly had more to learn, he was now a professional who could stand on his own.”
Those who have not yet read the subsequent series entry, “The Collected,” should waste no time correcting that situation. Both of these are wonderful, suspense-filled reads, and are highly recommended.
The problem with this type of story is it is almost too clever and the reader can quite easily get lost even though the action is fast and non stop. Mila Voss was assasinated in 2006 or was she?...only Quinn holds the answer to this dilemma and so far he is not telling...until the unthinkable happens and Voss is identified in the present. So did the cleaner "Quinn" not carry out his mission? The story moves at a swift pace across the world's continents heading towards a conclusion which will include double dealing and duplicity at the highest levels in the American government. I kept losing interest in the storyline at various stages thoughout, often having to backtrack to remind myself of the core plot/players at the centre of this political drama, and that to me is not the mark of a good read......
Love Jonathan Quinn!!! He’s always cleaning up someone, or killing someone, depends on the day, I guess. This was about Mila Voss, who was supposed to be killed years ago and Quinn was supposed to take care of the body, but it didn’t work out that way. She came back into the public eye and the killing came back into the forefront once again. There were so many twists and turns in this story you really had to keep track of who was doing what to whom.
It’s always such a treat reading about Quinn, Nate, Orlando and Daeng.
No sex and the F-bomb was used 6 times.
As to the narration: Not so good at the female’s voices but since there’s not but a woman or two in any of Jonathan Quinn’s books, it’s okay by me. He does a fantastic job of all the different voices of the men.
As an immense Brett Battles fan (and shameless advocate), I am always looking forward to Brett's next book. Whether it's the next Quinn installment or something new to try, I can always rely on a good read from Brett. The Destroyed is no different.
In the fifth installment, we find an entirely different Jonathan Quinn. Not the cleaner extraordinaire that we're used to but a man who has taken a sabbatical from his job as a cleaner, attempting to re-discover himself in Thailand after his last job; after his mother & sister are put in danger. After he realizes that the steps he took to protect his family and keep his true profession a secret were not enough. At the same time, we discover that Nate is no longer an apprentice, but a full-fledged cleaner, having taken over for Quinn while he is in Thailand. But that is not the crux of the story...
In the opening chapter, it's discovered that someone who Quinn "cleaned" has somehow come back to life, raising several questions about a job that was supposed to have been ordinary. Quinn is forced from the peaceful routine he has found back into his profession. With aid from Nate, Orlando, and a new character (who I really love), Quinn is forced to rectify a problem that should not have resurfaced.
I enjoyed this book immensely and the plot was easy to follow, even though it switches back and forth between the present and the past. Sometimes that transition throughout a book can be confusing. It was also pleasant to see Nate's character go from apprentice to cleaner.
If you have read the previous Quinn books, this one will not disappoint you. It's filled with the same action & drama as the other Quinn books, but I think Brett's writing has matured and you can see that in this story. If you haven't read any of the previous Quinn books, well, you should, even if you read them after this one.
This is the fifth in the Jonathan Quinn series which I have more or less read in order. Not to put anyone off, but I grabbed this for a distraction while getting ready for a colonscopy. It did the trick. It was well-written and an enjoyable read with only a few plot holes or jaw-drops so common in many so-called thrillers (a misnomer, surely, I mean, we all know the narrator/good guy wins in the end, right? )
Mila Voss, good friend and erstwhile lover of Julien, to whom Quinn owes a large debt for saving his life, has decided (just why now after all these years is a bit unclear) to get to the bottom of why she was targeted for assassination and had to go into hiding. Quinn, who has been hiding in Thailand for his own reasons, is contacted by Peter, a former client, when the facial scan of a stranger at an apparent suicide reveals an uncanny resemblance to Mila whose lifeless body Quinn had supposedly identified and “cleaned” up after her presumed assassination.
While I thought the “Cancer Project” was a bit thin as a plot device to explain the actions of several characters, the story flowed nicely and Quinn is an interesting character. I still wonder, though how Peter could have afforded all those fancy hideaways and cubby-holes in Washington for all those years, not to mention keeping track of all the keys and alarm codes. And did you ever notice how no one ever seems to have money issues but no ostensible paycheck?
The Quinn character is evolving. He has gone into seclusion at a temple in Thailand, working with a group of monks. Nate has been dealing with Quinn's clients, posing as Quinn.
Everything is about to change. One of Quinn's earlier cleanups has been spotted, very much alive, in Tanzania. The client wants to know how that can happen. Quinn, Nate, Orlando and Daeng (a character from Battles' Little Girl Gone) are on the move to keep Mila Voss from being 'cleaned' a second time.
It's a fun ride for the reader. As usual, Battles keeps the action moving and doesn't let the reader get bogged down with useless dialogue. Even the interplay between Nate and Quinn has its point in the story and the changing relationship between the two of them.
It will be interesting to see how the next "Cleaner" book comes out.
Loved this book as it showed the human side of what Jonathan's job is...a cleaner of sorts.It does affect you and cause you to take an introspective rather than the communative extrospection view of society. Nothing is as simple as it sounds or as easy as it is perceived. This is mainly a book that without reading the other fabulous books in the series, would leave you wanting.
I am really enjoying this series. The characters are likeable and enjoyable, however, the story line on this one, didn't go entirely up my wow meter - for sure..... Scott Brick always does a nice narration and makes any book enjoyable.
Great book and narration by Scott Brick. (audible review)
This was a good book. I really liked it. The back and forth was interesting. I wouldn't want to listen that all the time, but in this case it was okay. Save Mila Voss!
Again, action, intrigue and great characters.
The narration is excellent. I love Scott Brick, he does such a great job on all the voice and has a very sexy voice.
Battles is very gifted at constructing clever and compelling plot lines. But they have to be supported by believable characters, and hopefully expressed in prose that at the very least does not get in the way of the read. I loved the first books in the Quinn series -- The Cleaner and The Deceived -- but I sure did not love this one. Quinn comes out of moral-crisis retirement to join Nate in finding Mila Voss, a courier who was near and dear to a friend who died helping Quinn. So the task is to find Mila and save her. Yet she doesn't trust anyone and doesn't want to be saved; she has her own quest to fulfill. Unfortunately, this did not make her likable, or even someone I identified with or felt sympathy for: an essential element in this sort of story. I wish he'd gotten into her head a bit more to bolster her motivation and make us care more.
But my biggest problem with this novel was the writing itself. It was so sloppy that it left me shaking my head every few minutes. Word substitutions of the kind found in auto-guess spellcheckers were rampant. (I did read it on a Kindle, so they may not all have been the author's fault. Or perhaps he dictated the book using transcription software.) But the bad writing goes much further than sloppy sentence construction. Rather than giving us the insider details about how to pull off an op, we get lines like this, from Ch. 38: "The first thing they did was jam the maintenance closet door closed in a way only they would know how to easily open again." Okay, and how exactly did they manage that? I'd like to know. It's not like slapping a new password on a computer, or a padlock on a door. It's just plain laziness or lack of imagination. There's far too much of this sort of construction, and although the story moves, it lacks the structure and the intricacy I look for in an international thriller of this sort.
Lastly, it strains belief that Nate, with his artificial leg below the knee, could run so fast as to overtake Mila, and could leap from building to building. To me, not an insignificant detail.
I noted that Battles now self-publishes on CreateSpace/ Amazon, and I suspect that his earlier books were edited professionally, while this one is not. If so, big loss! But it could have been written by a 14 year-old. I would have crossed Battles off my to-read list permanently, except that I'd already purchased the next volume in the Quinn series, which turned out to be better. Not amazing, but better. See my review.
just a great novel. Battles just gets better with every book. Johnathon Quinn series, Project Eden series, Logan Harper series. all great, all on the low cost side. The other great thing is you don't have to sit around and wait a year plus to get a new book. Brett Battles pumps out quality at a good price. If you haven't read this author I strongly recommend you do. If you look at my ratings I have only given a few books 5 stars along with this one.
At first I was a little leery of this book, the beginning of the story has a lot of mysterious people not named trying to give a air of suspense to who was exactly who in the story. But then the book turn to a typical A+ Jonathan Quinn story. What makes this book even better is new characters that have been introduced into the plot and more emphasis on older more established characters. Well done and I'm looking forward to the next installment
The Destroyed is another solid entry in the Jonathan Quinn series. It picks up about nine months after the events of The Silenced. Quinn is hiding in a monastery in Thailand, trying to get his head together. Orlando is in San Fransisco with her son. And Nate is working full time as a cleaner, sometimes using the name Quinn to keep his reputation and business alive.
Mila Voss is tracing down the Lion, a man involved in a prisoner transport from years ago. The problem is Mila is supposed to be dead. Quinn was the cleaner on the hit, and he guaranteed to Peter that she was dead and buried. Olsen, from another agency, comes calling on Peter, demanding to know how she's still alive and forcing Peter to get this cleaned up. Peter has to scrounged together a few former associates, including Quinn who doesn't want to be found. When Nate locates him, Quinn has a new bodyguard, a former monk who wasn't always a monk named Daeng. Together they must reach Mila before anyone else does to keep her safe and unravel what is going on.
The Destroyed has lots of good action and a fairly complex storyline. Something a bit unusual in this genre is the physical and emotional toll this kind of work takes on the people involved. Jonathan Quinn isn't an unfeeling robot, and he recognizes it. He needs time to mentally recover from almost getting his family killed and Nate almost dying from helping him in a personal matter again. He knows if he isn't in top shape mentally, he can't do his job right. Later in the book, he is forced to listen to his people when they tell him he is the weak link. He may not like it, but he doesn't ignore their advice.
If you like good storytelling and an unusual job roll in the spy genre, this series is for you.
This book was Nate's debut as full fledge cleaner and not an apprentice. After the ordeal with Quinn's family being put at risk, Quinn is taking a sabbatical in a Bangkok monastery. Nate has been covering the business while Quinn is on his self-imposed exile. Sadly, the sabbatical didn't make Quinn any more patient or pleasant. In fact, his behavior and attitude were worse when he returned to help Mila. He was unlikeable throughout most of this book. Nate, however, handled himself well in spite of Quinn's attitude. A new character, Daeng, was introduced who may have some potential to be in future books. Based on the ending it will be curious to see if he becomes part of the team.
This book switches timelines between 2006 and the present which I typically don't like. The author did well in using the timeline changes to add a little more intrigue. For the most part, the switching back and forth worked well and didn't disrupt the flow too much except towards the end.
Overall, I'm a big fan of this series and plan to continue reading more books to see how the team progresses.
Being a fan of Brett Battles, I always looked forward to Brett's next book.
In this fifth installment of the Quinn series, we are introduced to a very different Jonathan Quinn. He's not the brilliant cleaner he used to be, he's taken a leave of absence from his job as a cleaner and is about to rediscover himself in Thailand after his last job. At the same time, it was encouraging to see that Nate is no longer an apprentice, but a full-fledged cleaner, replacing Quinn in Thailand.
In the early chapters, we find out that the people Quinn has "cleaned" have somehow come back to life, which raises some questions about what was supposed to be an ordinary job. Quinn is forced to return to his job from his previously peaceful life.
I enjoyed this book immensely and found the plot easy to follow, even though it moved back and forth between the present and the past.
The fifth installment of the Jonathan Quinn series finds him on a sabbatical at a monastery in Thailand. He is recuperating from his last mission that threatened his family and resulted in the death of a friend. It completely shattered the world that Quinn had carefully built for himself.
However, an old completed mission comes back to haunt him. A good deed he had done to protect a friend of the man that lost his life in his efforts to protect his family has opened up a can of worms that Quinn must fix. Nate, his ex-intern, finds Quinn and brings him the news. Quinn gathers his team and heads out to right the wrong.
The subsequent story of how he corrects the wrong is complicated, full of twist and turns and the details of espionage that makes the Quinn series so fun to read.
This story was incredible! Twists and turns; told in a flashback way that at times seemed confusing but it all came together in the end. The luck and skills of these special agents, the voices; the narrator was incredible as well. French and other languages were no problem for Scott Brick. I listen in the car and doing chores around the house and I had no trouble remembering what had happened. The feelings and emotions and the utter frustration came through time and time again. A book I will not soon forget. I will look for other books in the series especially if the narrator is the same as in this book. Loved that voice!
That’s what the team hired to terminate her had reported, and that’s how her file had been marked.
Dead. Six years now.
So why did she suddenly show up on a hotel’s security camera in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania? Those who’d paid for her elimination are more than a little curious.
One person should know what happened—Jonathan Quinn, one of the best cleaners in the business, the man who’d been tasked with the disposal of her body.
Only Quinn isn’t exactly easy to get ahold of these days, and he may not be willing to share the answer.
Quinn has become reclusive in a remote area and is trying to recover from the pain inflicted when his true family was found and threatened during his last job. Nate has been running the business and nothing will get Quinn to return, nothing except a former job that did not go the way it was planned.
I enjoyed this adventure, but it did jump back and forth between events 10 years apart. That, or the fact that I was flying 12 hours on the busiest day of the year for airline travel, made it hard to concentrate on both parts of the adventure.
A girl that Quinn was supposed to clean up after she was killed is seen in Africa. Now the powers that be want to know why she is alive and then to have her killed for sure. The story goes back in forth between the present and past when she was supposed to die the first time. A good book in the series. If you read this one out of order you will be missing a lot of backstory. Quinn and Nate make a good team.
This is usually a magnificent series. This installment bored me to tears, and no matter what I did, I couldn't stay focused on it. The author doubtless despises me although we've never met. But be patient. My next review of "Pale Horse" from the Eden series will eradicate any bad feelings that might arise because of this. That book is a 20-star propulsive extravaganza in a five-star world. But more on that when I get there.
I have really been enjoying this series. I love the characters and while it's pretty standard "spy" fare I feel like each novel is unique. When I got to the end of this one I felt like the series ended satisfactorily. I was surprised to see it continues. I'm afraid it can only go downhill but I'll probably pick up the next one anyway.
It’s always great when someone gets vengeance! It’s a good read with a decent plot. It gets to be annoying, though, when the author is constantly bouncing back and forth in time. In this novel, it appears as if the main character will be taking a back seat and his apprentice cleaner will be taking over. It all remains to be seen.
Brett Battle's writing prowess, compelling characters, engrossing plot, and thought-provoking themes make this novel an absolute must-read for fans of action-packed thrillers. It's a testament to Battle's talent as a writer and his ability to create an immersive, unforgettable reading experience. I wholeheartedly recommend "The Destroyed" to anyone seeking a gripping, five-star-worthy adventure.
"The destroyed " by Brett Battles is an action-packed tale with twist & turns that make it hard to put down. Quinn is on sabbatical in Thailand, arranged by Orlando. Nate posing as Quinn countinues the cleaner assignments. A past acquaintance comes out of hiding to prevent bad players in the Us government from gaining power. She needs to be saved. 5 stars.
A brilliant story once again, they just keep getting more involved and full of intrigue with the character's never ending endurance action packed all the way
I love this series so much I bought a kindle just so I could read the entire series. Not available on my Nook. That pretty much says it all. Keep Quinn and Nate in action. Yeah!!!!!