Grigory Rasputin

Okay but... Alternates between broadbrush narrative and hyper detail, which feels strange. Seems like JR is the only human with intelligence. Everyone else is a clown unless they're a military police superstar. In my own personal experience with a good number of MPs, I didn't meet any with more than very basic abilities and sense. The lassie gets hot and dirty with JR within just a couple of days, but by the end it turns out she was already in a relationship with her colleague and rides into the sunset with him instead of JR. The end is a bit anticlimactic. Shoot the villain from far distance, chase the guy in a van with a helicopter and evaporate him in an explosion. Meh... The single most annoying thing throughout the book (seems like every other sentence) is that spoken phrases end with "right?" from multiple speakers. Was that way of talking so prevalent in the early 90s? I don't remember it like that. I hope later books by Child don't use this style, right? Lazy writing, proofreading and editing.

Storylines are mostly good, and reasonably inventive. Transposing early 21st century genderism on the characters detracts from the characters and stories. The term "ping" is used by more than one author when referring to being contacted, which automatically dates the writing and authors - just lazy writing. Same with transportation tropes - repetitive and unoriginal.

Whilst this book in itself is a nicely illustrated depiction of a normal little boy growing through a stage in life where pretence and acting out are common and to be encouraged, it has acquired a different meaning in current (2023) gender politics. People of the age of Julian are quite suggestible and it is irresponsible to assert that Julian is gender confused when all any child of that age wants to do is dress up and pretend. Making this quaint story ore that that is just plain wrong. That's not to say that some young people who dress up do actually have gender identity thoughts, but it is the minority, and encouraging gender diversity at that age is damaging to the individual and society. So, a nice quaint story of normal behaviour misrepresented as a gender identity driver.