Dark Market [Format Kindle]

I was given this free by the author to read and review.
This is a fast paced novel with the action scenes much in the style of Lee Child although the plot is more complex. John Savage, investigator for the FSA (Financial Services Agency) and ex mercenary has a troubled past in the Middle East and nightmares of what happened, revealed in the first few chapters, colour his actions throughout the book. I thought that after a fairly uncertain start the book was a good read with a fairly complex plot with Savage trying to find out where a bank's money had disappeared which is only the start of his adventures. I liked how the characters and locations were described with even the minor characters although larger than life believable. There are a number of strands which all come together in a satisfactory conclusion at the end.
Well worth a read.

I must admit that while reading the beginning of "Dark Market" I was disoriented. There's a guy who commits suicide and we do not understand why. There is a group of mercenaries in the Middle East caught up in frenetic action scenes, not easy to imagine, as it is a book, not a movie.
But I went ahead and here emerges in all its fullness the character of John Savage and a story that is both action-packed, but with a carefully constructed plot, in which all the elements that appear along the narrative get slowly together to form a perfect combination.
The author's style is direct, funny, throws you right into the action, in a world in which a commissioned murder has become a game of the powerful. The characters are well defined and credible in the context of what is normally considered credible in an action-thriller, a genre that I love on the screen and I'm not displeased to see represented in a book. My fantasy is perfectly able to provide the visual part and the narrative of Coles makes this task even easier.
No doubt this is an author who deserves some attention and "Dark Market" is a reading that I recommend to all lovers of books with a complex fast-paced plot.
It is also the first book in a series, starring John Savage. I'll definitely be curious to read the others to come.

Dark Market by Frank Coles both entertained and infuriated me (often at the same time). I'm not a big fan of the Jack Reacher type of Teflon-coated action man and the central character in Dark Market, John Savage, definitely falls into that category. However, there is something very human about Savage which made me root for him, even when part of my brain was saying, oh for goodness sake, surely with so many guns and so much muscle against him he should be dead by now!

This is, first and foremost, an action novel, but it is saved from being a predictable shoot-em-up by a complex and well thought out plot. John Savage is an investigator for the Financial Services Agency, but if this is the type of person they are now using I would say the banking world should be trembling in fear. Savage returns from the Middle East, where he has been working as a mercenary, after he finds a link between a murdered news reporter and the suicide he'd caused years earlier. Once back in his old job at the bank he begins to delve into crimes, cover ups, scandal and intrigue on a massive scale. The dark market of the title refers to a `game' whereby anyone with the right amount of money can arrange for whoever they choose to be an assassin's target and the bank is facilitating it. A premise disturbingly possible.

I found the book's opening section less than engrossing, but I'm glad I persevered because the book gets better and better as it progresses. Characterisation is good; even though most of the characters are a bit OTT, they are still credible.

Would I read another John Savage tale of death and destruction if Frank Coles produces one? On balance, yes, I would.