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    The Empty Quarter
    The Empty Quarter
    The Empty Quarter
    Audiobook10 hours

    The Empty Quarter

    Written by David L. Robbins

    3.5/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    Every member of the Special Ops US Air Force pararescue jumpers, the PJs, swears by the motto “That Others May Live.” A top-secret mission to save a kidnapped Saudi princess will put that oath to the ultimate test.

    With a force of armed men, a former mujahideen chases across the desert of Yemen to recover his Saudi wife, kidnapped by her powerful father, a prince of the Kingdom. The kidnapping turns violent, she is badly wounded, and the PJs are dropped into the vast sere badlands to rescue the princess and a young American diplomat swept up in the plot. The mission becomes a minute-by-minute race between the pursuing husband’s band of tribal allies and the PJs rushing to the rescue, as the princess’s life seeps away.

    The Empty Quarter is a pulse-quickening tour de force featuring the tactics and men of modern combat search-and-rescue and the complex politics of today’s Arabian peninsula. It’s a moving tale of desperate love and sacrifice set in the wastes of the Rub’ al Khali, the world’s largest and harshest sand desert.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBrilliance Audio
    Release dateAug 1, 2014
    ISBN9781491525371
    The Empty Quarter
    Author

    David L. Robbins

    New York Times bestselling author David L. Robbins has published thirteen action-packed novels, including War of the Rats, Broken Jewel, The Betrayal Game, The Assassins Gallery, and Scorched Earth. His latest literary efforts explore the adventures and extraordinary talents of the US military’s most elite Special Forces group, the US Air Force’s pararescuemen, known as the PJs, serving under the motto “That Others May Live.” An award-winning essayist and screenwriter, Robbins founded the James River Writers, an organization dedicated to supporting professional and aspiring authors. He also cofounded the Podium Foundation, which encourages artistic expression in Richmond’s public schools. Lately his charitable energies have gone into creating the Mighty Pen Project, a writing program for Virginia’s military veterans. Robbins is an avid sailor on the Chesapeake Bay and extends his creative scope beyond fiction as an accomplished guitarist. He currently teaches advanced creative writing at Virginia Commonwealth University Honors College. Robbins lives in his hometown of Richmond, Virginia.

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    Reviews for The Empty Quarter

    3.5/5

    23 ratings2 reviews

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    • 4/5
      What an exciting adventure combining military and medical thriller elements! It takes place in the Rub’ al-Khali, the world’s largest desert (“the empty quarter”), which occupies most of the southern third of the Arabian Peninsula. People are scarce there, except for the ones you most do not want to meet. It’s a multiple point-of-view novel, told mostly from the perspectives of members of a U.S. Air Force pararescuemen (PJs) team. PJs’ combined military-medical mission is personnel recovery, and they use both conventional and unconventional combat rescue methods. The motto of this branch of service is “That Others May Live,” and Robbins effectively describes the team members’ dedication to that mission, despite their differences in personality and temperament. We also read the point of view of Arif, a middle-aged Saudi man whose wife Nadya is a member of the Saudi royal family. Her father, Prince Hassan bin Abd al-Aziz is the country’s head of security. Arif has fallen out with his father-in-law, and he and Nadya are in hiding in the tiny Yemeni town of Ma’rib. Robbins portrays their mutual devotion quite movingly. A third key point of view is that of Josh Cofield, a former Army Ranger, assigned to the American Embassy in the Yemeni capital Sana’a. Everyone, the ambassador included, erroneously believes Josh is CIA, because he is “awkward as a diplomat,” a bit of a bull in a china shop, but a skilled speaker of Arabic.When an attempt is made on Prince Aziz’s life, he mistakenly blames the exiled Arif. He wants his son-in-law dead and his daughter returned to him, and he wants U.S. help in achieving these goals He cannot get it, however, unless an American life is threatened. A plan begins to take shape in diabolical minds. A wild nighttime chase across the desert occupies the last half of the book. Part of Robbins’s skill is in avoiding making any of the principal players obvious bad guys. They’re complex characters with conflicting goals, and all doing their best to resolve an impossible situation. I appreciated that the book includes helpful maps. Not as helpful—and something readers are bound to object to—is the frequent use of military abbreviations and acronyms. While Robbins defines a few of these in footnotes, it might have been better to have a list in an appendix or to retain the abbreviations in speech, but not rely on them as much in the narrative. It would be a shame if readers abandoned a top-notch tale because of the resulting confusion. Robbins has 10 other novels under his body armor. I’ll be reading more of them!
    • 3/5
      Do you want to read an action thriller about pararescue jumpers?Maybe that's too focused. How about a military action thriller? Then this book is also fine. I don't think it's good enough to recommend outside genre.Although it's not billed as such, it's a sequel to The Devil's Waters. There are a few passages that tie back to the earlier battles of this group of PJs. If you liked that book, then you likely will enjoy this one.