Book: The Target by David Baldacci

The TargetThe Target (Will Robie #3)

An okay read but not compelling. Official synopsis below.
The President knows it’s a perilous, high-risk assignment. If he gives the order, he has the opportunity to take down a global menace, once and for all. If the mission fails, he would face certain impeachment, and the threats against the nation would multiply. So the president turns to the one team that can pull off the impossible: Will Robie and his partner, Jessica Reel.Together, Robie and Reel’s talents as assassins are unmatched. But there are some in power who don’t trust the pair. They doubt their willingness to follow orders. And they will do anything to see that the two assassins succeed, but that they do not survive.As they prepare for their mission, Reel faces a personal crisis that could well lead old enemies right to her doorstep, resurrecting the ghosts of her earlier life and bringing stark danger to all those close to her. And all the while, Robie and Reel are stalked by a new adversary: an unknown and unlikely assassin, a woman who has trained her entire life to kill, and who has her own list of targets—a list that includes Will Robie and Jessica Reel.

Gray Mountain by John Grisham

Gray MountainThe year is 2008 and Samantha Kofer’s career at a huge Wall Street law firm is on the fast track—until the recession hits and she gets downsized, furloughed, escorted out of the building. Samantha, though, is one of the “lucky” associates. She’s offered an opportunity to work at a legal aid clinic for one year without pay, after which there would be a slim chance that she’d get her old job back.

In a matter of days Samantha moves from Manhattan to Brady, Virginia, population 2,200, in the heart of Appalachia, a part of the world she has only read about. Mattie Wyatt, lifelong Brady resident and head of the town’s legal aid clinic, is there to teach her how to “help real people with real problems.” For the first time in her career, Samantha prepares a lawsuit, sees the inside of an actual courtroom, gets scolded by a judge, and receives threats from locals who aren’t so thrilled to have a big-city lawyer in town. And she learns that Brady, like most small towns, harbors some big secrets.

Her new job takes Samantha into the murky and dangerous world of coal mining, where laws are often broken, rules are ignored, regulations are flouted, communities are divided, and the land itself is under attack from Big Coal. Violence is always just around the corner, and within weeks Samantha finds herself engulfed in litigation that turns deadly.

The Godfather’s Revenge

The Godfather's Revenge book coverFinally finished reading The Godfather’s Revenge, a 2006 novel written by Mark Winegardner, it’s the sequel to The Godfather and The Godfather Returns. The story takes place from 1963–1964 and picks up the story from where The Godfather Returns left off.

Novels

The Godfather
The Sicilian
The Godfather Returns
The Godfather’s Revenge
The Family Corleone

Films

The Godfather
The Godfather Part II
The Godfather Part III

Mark Winegardner (born November 24, 1961) is an American writer born and raised in Bryan, Ohio. His novels include The Godfather Returns, Crooked River Burning, and The Veracruz Blues. He published a collection of short stories, That’s True of Everybody, in 2002. His newest novel, The Godfather’s Revenge, was published in November 2006 by Putnam. His Godfather novels continue the story of the Corleone family depicted in Mario Puzo’s The Godfather.