Blood Trails

A novella of Texans hunting terrorists, Nicholas Orr’s Blood Trails is not very substantive. On one hand, it’s short and its plot is nothing that hasn’t been done many times before. That’s not an obstacle to a good book, and neither is the “Herman Melville’s Guide To Patrolling” exposition.

What is an obstacle is the fact that the final climactic battle also reads just as dryly as those infodumps. This is the one thing a thriller cannot be, and it’s what turns it from a possible 51% snack into a rejection in my eyes. Which is a shame, but oh well.