Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Ludlum is better than this. Filled to the brim with expositional dialogue and ridiculous plot twists, "The Bourne Ultimatum" is half a good novel. The good part is pure Ludlum; the abliity to weave a good yarn of intrigue and suspense. But the bad is a Jason Bourne who makes one elementary mistake after another; mistakes of judgement that your auntie wouldn't make if she had even the smallest iota of common sense. Bourne does not. Neither does his wife. Nor does his secret agent friends. Heck, you or I could have killed Carlos the Jackel five times in the course of this book, but Jason Bourne can't get it done. I finally assumed that Bourne's primary objective was to inflate Ludlum's page count, and the FUNDAMENTAL mistakes he made regarding his family had me rooting for the bad guy to off them just to make Bourne pay for his bone-headedness. With an entire world in which to hide, Bourne sends his kids to an island that even the worst private detective could find in a day, and you know what, that's exactly what happens. In addition to the "trail of crumbs" method of concealment he employs, just about everyone Bourne knows jumps on a jet and follows him to Paris so even blind people can follow them to the gifted Jason. His own dimwit wife follows him there, and darn it, it just made me want her dead. Sorry. I love the Bourne character, but this foolish person makes you cringe every time he says, "It's him. The Jackel," and believe you me, he says it about fifty thousand times. Bottom line, a cat has nine lives, but if this version of Jason Bourne were hunting him, he'd have a hundred and nine.