{"id":38457,"date":"2025-03-24T08:05:00","date_gmt":"2025-03-24T12:05:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/?p=38457"},"modified":"2025-02-27T17:28:50","modified_gmt":"2025-02-27T22:28:50","slug":"joe-ledger-secret-missions-volume-one-by-jonathan-maberry-z-view","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/?p=38457","title":{"rendered":"JOE LEDGER: SECRET MISSIONS VOLUME ONE by Jonathan Maberry \/ Z-View"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/4h2HVMr\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter\" src=\"http:\/\/stallonezone.com\/zone\/2025\/z032425zview_joeledger_sm1.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"750\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/3CZZ3o5\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">JOE LEDGER: SECRET MISSIONS VOLUME ONE<\/a> by Jonathan Maberry<\/p>\n<p>First sentence&#8230;<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">For the record, I don&#8217;t believe in this stuff.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>The Overview:\u00a0 Beware of Spoilers\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Joe Ledger is an ex-Army Ranger and ex-Baltimore police detective.\u00a0 Ledger was recruited and is now an agent for the United States&#8217; several-levels-above-top-secret Department of Military Sciences.\u00a0 This organization deals with threats not only to the US, but the world.\u00a0 Most of their missions involve stopping terrorists using advanced technology to create bio-weapons.\u00a0 Some of Ledger&#8217;s assignments have ventured into the realm of the supernatural&#8230; and while Ledger might not believe in that &#8220;stuff&#8221; &#8212; his team has to deal with it.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>JOE LEDGER: SECRET MISSIONS VOLUME ONE<\/strong> features six tales.\u00a0 Five by Maberry and one (<em>Mantis<\/em>) by Maberry and Marie Whittaker.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><em><strong>A Footnote in the Black Budget<\/strong><\/em> &#8211; In a relatively small area in Antarctica the US, Russia and China have research facilities.\u00a0 Less than 24 hours ago, the Russian and Chinese operations went dark.\u00a0 Now communication with the US facility is dead.\u00a0 Ledger, First Sergeant Bradley &#8220;Top&#8221; &#8220;Sgt. Rock&#8221; Sims and Master Sergeant Harvey &#8220;Bunny&#8221; Rabbit are sent in to investigate.\u00a0 These are three of our best DMS soldiers.\u00a0 They may not be enough.<\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong><em>A Hot Time in the Old Town Tonight<\/em><\/strong> &#8211; In a small western Pennsylvania town (if you know, you know) <em>Lucifer 113<\/em> was unleashed.\u00a0 Lucifer 113 was a doomsday bioweapon. Near 100% infection rate, near 100% mortality rate. To be used only as a last resort.\u00a0 If defeat was inevitable, release Lucifer 113.\u00a0 And some terrorist has released it.<\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong><em>Alive Day<\/em><\/strong> &#8211; Ledger, Top and Bunny are sent on an off-the-books rescue mission for four members of Rattlesnake team.\u00a0 Taliban warriors will be the least of their worries.\u00a0 Haunted caves? Visions? What did happen to Rattlesnake team?<\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong><em>Wet Works: A V-Wars Story<\/em><\/strong> &#8211; Ledger and a doctor are barricaded in a room.\u00a0 Ledger has used all his ammo.\u00a0 Dead bodies litter the floor.\u00a0 With only a knife to protect them, Ledger knows it won&#8217;t be enough.\u00a0 The vampires (no, they don&#8217;t turn in to bats, or fly, but they ARE vampires) are waiting for reinforcements.\u00a0 They will then bust through and kill Ledger and the doc.\u00a0 Ledger will go down fighting, but he knows there are too many&#8230;<\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong><em>Mantis: A Rouge Team International \/ Arklight Adventure<\/em><\/strong> &#8211; An international child trafficking organization, a well-disguised well-trained vigilante, and Violin, one of Arklight&#8217;s most dangerous assassins &#8212; with Ledger smack dab in the middle.\u00a0 What could go wrong?<\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong><em>Atoll<\/em> <\/strong>&#8211; &#8220;Something has crashed on an island south of Hawaii.&#8221;\u00a0 Ledger&#8217;s team is tapped to investigate.\u00a0 When he asks why a closer squad out of Honolulu isn&#8217;t being sent, he&#8217;s told, &#8220;It was&#8230; we&#8217;ve lost contact with them.&#8221;\u00a0 UFOs, time travel &#8212; more stuff Ledger probably doesn&#8217;t believe in.\u00a0 At least at the start of the mission.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">If you&#8217;ve never read any of the Joe Ledger novels, this is a good jumping on point.\u00a0 You&#8217;ll get a nice taste of the kind of tales that feature Ledger along with some crossovers from other characters\/situations in the Maberry universe.\u00a0 Regular readers will love visits to the worlds of<em> V-WARS, Pine Deep, Sam Hunter Case Files, Dead of Night,<\/em> and <em>Rot &amp; Ruin<\/em>.\u00a0 Look for characters such Mr. Church, Echo Team, Havoc Team, Malcolm Crow, Mike Sweeney, Violin, Toys and others.<\/p>\n<p>Jonathan Maberry has another winner!\u00a0 I love the Joe Ledger tales.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>Rating:<\/strong><br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/stallonezone.com\/zone\/logo\/zview_a.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"100\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>JOE LEDGER: SECRET MISSIONS VOLUME ONE by Jonathan Maberry First sentence&#8230; For the record, I don&#8217;t believe in this stuff.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":912,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[61,52,51,53,74],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-38457","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-authors","category-books","category-crime","category-horror","category-z-view"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38457","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/912"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=38457"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38457\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":38460,"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38457\/revisions\/38460"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=38457"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=38457"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=38457"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}