As a long-time Clancy fan, I have a real affection for some of the characters that continue to inhabit his stories. John Clark and Ding Chavez play primary roles in Locked On, and it's hard to do anything but root for them. However, Clancy's writing has gone significantly downhill, and this book is just the latest example of that slide.

Clancy lovers have come to expect long, thick novels, and picking this one up off the shelf leads you to believe that it is another of similar size to classics like Red Storm Rising or Clear and Present Danger. However, opening the 900-page book you find that the publisher has reverted to tricks a lazy student uses with a college paper - wide margins, large line spacing, big fonts. There is probably only 60% of the content that used to be in a 900-page Clancy novel.

The book is also sloppily edited. For example, at one point it is noted that Chavez and Clark have been partners "for over 20 years". Further on, though, Chavez says that Clark "is more than twice my age - what, 63, 64?" It doesn't take a math whiz to figure out those numbers are screwed up.

Back in the glory days of this genre, Clancy was cranking out great stuff, WEB Griffin was top-notch, and Larry Bond was putting out some good stuff in the genre when he wasn't co-writing with Clancy. Today, though, I haven't found a younger author to fill that void; everybody seems to be focused on writing 300-page quickies rather than Clancy-length epics. Sad.

Clancy is back with a Jack Ryan novel years after his previous one. Ryan actually plays only a minor part in this book, with the primary narrative focus being on John Clark, Ding Chavez, and Jack Ryan, Jr. The threat abroad is still nukes and wacko Muslims, and the threat at home is still politicians who don't understand the value of a strong CIA and strong military. So yeah, it's basically the same note Clancy has been playing for years now.

The book runs to 950 pages, but the margins and line spacing are larger than his older novels, so it's not quite the same length as, say, The Sum of All Fears. Multiple characters are introduced and woven together in classic Clancy style, and the book would probably work better as a stand-alone novel than as a follow-up to a classic series.

As a sidenote, the proofreading was apparently sloppy; I caught four typos in my quick read of the book.

Not a bad read; better than most of what is out in this genre today, but not up to the level you'd expect from classic Clancy.