Flight of the Old Dog

Title: Flight of the Old Dog

Author: Dale Brown

Publisher: Penguin Group
Publication Date: May 1988
Genre: Techno-Thriller
Pages: 416

I love a good military story. Then, in the 1980's, the military story was redefined when Tom Clancy burst onto the literary scene with The Hunt for Red October, and a new literary term was born: Techno-Thriller. That term played in my brain for a very long time. I had a hunger for techno-thrillers. Hell, I was starving for them. Then, in 1988, Dale Brown released Flight of the Old Dog. Can you hear the dinner bell? I did!

Flight of the Old Dog is the first book in the Patrick McLanahan series, and what an opening for a series.

This book is set during the  Cold War. The Soviet Union is developing a weapon that will knock anything out of the sky. A laser based weapon. And it works with dazzling success. It even knocked a B-1 bomber out o the sky as easily as swatting flies. All seems hopeless. Until it is revealed that in the desert is a secret Air Force base that is working on advanced technology. This technology is going into a refitted B-52 bomber named "Old Dog". Hope is sparked as the Old Dog takes flight during an attack on the base. The question now is will she succeed?

This is a techno thriller that is heavy on the TECHNO and the THRILLER. Sometimes it bogs down with all of the techno jargon and a glossary would have really helped. Unfortunately, I had to gloss over the jargon and I found that it took away from the book, but not so much that I had to put it down. There was enough twists and turns in the story to keep my interest.

4 out of 5 stars
Re-readable factor of 2 out of 5