I liked The Nowhere Man by Gregg Hurwitz: 3 Stars. Recommend 👍.
I thought book #1, Orphan X, and book #3, Hellbent, were better. This book seemed to lag and become tedious several chapters before the climax.
The Nowhere Man is the 2nd "Orphan X" novel. The novels are "Secret Agent" type of action thrillers. In these novels orphans vanish into the "Orphan Program"-a CIA type of agency where these select orphans are trained from childhood to be invisible and extraordinarily dangerous. Orphans are one person Mission Impossible agents. Evan Smoke is Orphan X a designation similar to 007. For reasons established in the first book, he has gone rogue. As our protagonist he becomes a John Wick type of Ray Donovan except he fixes the nightmares of desperate folks who have nowhere to turn for help.
She stops sleeping. She starts plucking out her hair in patches. She cuts herself at school, hoping the pain will wake her from this nightmare.
Father of one of her classmates see the signs. He finds her sobbing in a 7-Eleven bathroom when she should be in homeroom. With a cane and fresh limp he goes and gives her a phone number: 1-855-2-NOWHERE. "He'll answer. He'll help," the injured friend's father says. She dials.
Evan, avoids attention. Detection by the Orphan Program could be fatal. He attends Homeowner's Association meetings. He mentions his business importing cleaning chemicals. Evan is aptly polite, mannered, and palatially invisible.
When 1-855-2-NOWHERE rings, The Nowhere Man becomes a Guardian Angel. Evan Smoak picks up, “Do you need my help?”
17 hours later "sobbing girl" is jubilant.
I could enjoy Orphan X saving distressed folks from the waking nightmares they fall into for 400 pages, but Mr. Hurwitz didn't plot this novel to please me.
Orphan X, book #1 spoiler
Things changed after Orphan X disappeared. Evan Smoak's Nemeses, Charles Van Sciver, Orphan Y, took over the Orphan Program. He hated Evan all the way back to the East Baltimore Orphanage where they both languished. Evan was the scrawny little twelve year old Charles enjoyed tormenting. The Mystery Man chose Evan instead of Charles. Evan became Orphan X, Charles later became Orphan Y. Now X is the program's #1 fugitive. Other orphans gravely yearn to be first at Orphan X.
The Nowhere Man Spoilers
Evan realized he had overlooked an important detail while "fixing" sobbing girl's problem. That rare lapse meant there are other sobbing girls in danger or worse. Next day, after picking up a replacement samurai sword he had lost in the previous book he went to the site he had not thought to check related to his sobbing girl mission.
More conflict and excitement. Evan, outnumbered but managed to take care of the remaining sex traffickers. Leaving the sex trafficking holding dungeon he had overlooked, intent on saving one more girl, he is battered with non-lethal weapons and captured in a wildlife-capture net. Unable to move, he can't see who is approaching with a syringe. Before blacking out, he expects to wake tied to a chair in a torture chamber, or not at all.
Evan wakes naked in a plush resort room complete with wardrobe and bathroom. Upon inspection, he discovers it is an elaborate prison, a very comfortable one - possibly in Switzerland. Shortly his warden arrives. He's surprised it is not his nemesis, Charles Van Sciver. The warden knows much about Evan's anonymous bank account in Switzerland, but isn't sure about much else.
Read and listened between 9-8-17 and 9-9-17 and again between 8-6-2019 and 8-7-2019.
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