Title: Root and Branch
Author: Preston Fleming
Genre: Fiction / Thriller
Publisher: PF Press (June 9, 2020)
ASIN: B089B63L32
Reviewed by Dr. Wesley Britton originally for BookPleasures.com
I've been a fan of Preston Fleming thrillers for years. I have reviewed all of them for
BookPleasures.com including Star Chamber Brotherhood (2010), Forty Days at Kamas (2010--one of my favorites), Bride of a Bygone War (2011, another personal favorite), Dynamite Fishermen (2011), Exile Hunter (2013), and Maid of Baikal (2017). So I think it safe to say I am pretty familiar with the Preston Fleming catalogue.
Characteristics you can see in all his works include extremely believable situations and topical storylines, vivid characters, detailed descriptions, and an obvious familiarity with the workings of power brokers and international relations at the highest levels.
You will find all these attributes in Root and Branch, a novel opening after several electromagnetic pulse nuclear bombs from Iran, Pakistan, and North Korea have been detonated along the east and west coasts of the U.S., destroying much of our electronic infrastructure. After this setup, Root and Branch is all about our responses to this Intifada, a cultural clash that continues to escalate and escalate into chilling choices that might not have been plausible a few years ago, but are frighteningly possible now.
Choices include an American government willing to suspend civil rights for all Muslims and anyone, including American citizens, who might be deemed sympathetic to the Jihad; a government willing to perpetrate horrifying scenes of outright murder of both criminals and suspects; a government willing to create international rendition camps far beyond the scope of the 9/11 aftermath; and, well, I don't want to provide spoilers here. Suffice it to say, you'll have a hard time forgetting what Fleming proposes we'd be capable of in revenge for any Intifada.
The principal protagonist is former CIA operative Roger Zorn, a French/American executive who runs a global security company his father founded. It covertly protects government and corporate assets and provides air freight operations and security all over the globe. His company developed a sophisticated “triage” algorithm that can determine whether or not individuals are likely to commit violent acts. The U.S. government wants to use his algorithm in its war against the Jihad. But Zorn slowly comes to learn about the moral consequences of his company's product being used in deadly and illegal actions by the American government. The main dilemma of the book is Zorn's inner turmoil over what to do once he learns what his technology is resulting in. What is his responsibility for what he discovers, even if what he sees is classified and therefor he can say nothing in public? What about the economic impact he might face if he pulls out of the lucrative contracts keeping his company afloat?
In short, the principal conflict we witness in Root and Branch is internal, moral and cerebral. Which results in a very talky book where we watch Zorn wrestle and wrestle with trying to come to the decisions tearing up his soul.
I understand why so many fellow readers, especially fellow Fleming fans, find Root and Branch a tale that isn't ranked as highly as some of Fleming's other efforts. There are long sections of Zorn trapped in his internal inactivity, long sections where events seem drawn out and the reader may start crying out, "Do something already!"
But I found the book a worthwhile read precisely because of the questions it raises--what would we be willing to accept, what would we take as necessary actions when fighting a deadly Intifada? What rights would we give up? What liberties would we sacrifice in the name of security? Uncomfortable as these questions might be, we do live in a world where we do wrestle with such concerns on nearly a daily basis. So I not only recommend this book, I encourage it as important reading for those watching our world that's been dealing with these questions since 9/11.
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