The Traitor

In I Am the Weapon, his name was Ben and he was sent to kill the mayor of New York.  I loved it.  In I Am the Mission, his name was Daniel and he had to infiltrate a terrorist militia compound.  Good stuff.  And finally, the third one, I Am the Traitor, has arrived, and he's come back to his own name--Zach--and he's out to take down the Program that turned him into a killer.

If that sounds like it's from a movie trailer, it should, because that's what this whole series reads like--a rampaging action movie. And it moves--all the deep background stuff that's been going on in the first few books pays off here--Zach's friendship with Howard, his confusing relationship with Mike, Mother and Father and Zach's memories of his childhood.  He's driving toward the truth throughout this book, and it's just where you want him to go.

There are some drawbacks along the way.  There's a girl (as there was in each of the other two books) who seems to be jammed kind of forcibly into the plot.  There are a lot of scenes where they're going from one place to another in what, if you stop to think about it, isn't really a very well-thought-through plan.  Howard manages not to get killed in some of the most unlikely scenarios.

But you don't want to nitpick with a book like this.  If the costuming isn't perfect, if the setup isn't convincing, well, the scenery whips by fast enough for it to go unnoticed if you squint.  The building is intense, and the denouement (if one can use such a word for such a book), if unlikely, is a satisfying ending to what's gone on so far.

So, is it as good as the first two?  No.  Does it deliver what you need to wrap up a really cool series?  Yeah, I would say so.