Control Point

Written by Myke Cole

Narrated by Korey Jackson

Myke Cole is an expert at ratcheting up suspense and delivering pulse-pounding adventure that leaves audiences breathless. In Shadow Ops: Control Point, the world has seemingly gone mad. People are waking up with magical powers, such as the ability to raise the dead or call forth storms. The only thing staving off a plunge into chaos is the Supernatural Operations Corps, headed by Oscar Britton. But when Oscar exhibits a power of his own, the hunter becomes the hunted.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Recorded Books, Inc.
• Release date: May 11, 2012
• ISBN: 9781464029608

Myke Cole

Following a long career in the military, intelligence, and law enforcement, Myke Cole is a fire/rescue responder in NY's Hudson Valley. He is a freelance historian and writer, and has published ten novels with publishers including Penguin Random House and Macmillan in addition to his history books for Osprey. Myke's short work has appeared in The New York Times, Smithsonian Magazine, The Daily Beast, Foreign Policy, The New Republic, McSweeney's, and Slate. He's starred on TV shows on CBS and Discovery, and has featured on NPR.

Reviews for Control Point

[wodenthewanderer · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Fairly good first book. Intriguing concept, especially with how Cole presented how some of the abilities could be used (particularly the combat capabilities of some of the more unique powers). Cole's off to a good start, and I was interested enough to pick up the second, which I'll probably read shortly.

[punchout_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

What started out as a wonderful read gradually progressed into pure torture. With all the abilities characters have in the book one would expect more excitement, you never get it. I only rated this a three star because there is no option for a 2 and a half.

[lisa_bouchard_4 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Four points for a book that earns 4 of 5 stars from me.First, I am not a military fiction fan – it’s technical in ways that make me run to the glossary or the internet to understand what I’m reading so I found that part distracting. If you’ve served in the military or even have a passing interest in things like guns and helicopters and military stuff this will be no problem at all. It took me a while to warm up to the book and the characters because of this.Second – All that fighting really started to get to me. It’s just not my thing – nothing else to say about that. Except I suppose it’s good I’ve never been in the military.Third – I gave this book four stars because by the end of the book nothing from numbers one or two mattered. I was so wrapped up in Oscar Britton’s struggle to find his own way in life (trying not to spoil here) that I spent my afternoon reading the second half of the book non-stop.Fourth – I loved the modern fantasy fiction feel of this book. Magic, military and modern day life made this book, in the end, a compelling read. I will definitely read the next book in the series (which is being edited right now, not sure of its publication date).

[elysianfield_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

All over the world people are getting magical powers. Oscar Britton, military officer, and his unit are told to take part of an operation to take down two Selfers (who use magic unsupervised) at a local school. Britton is not happy when he discovers that they are hunting two teenagers and to his horror the girl is executed in front of his eyes. So when he manifested magical ability after the operation, he’s convinced that they will kill him on the spot and decides the best action is to run.

The book is very action packed from the start but it still moved little slow when Britton was on the run. It did pick up pace when he was in training and learned to control his powers.
At first I was bit overwhelmed with all the military terms and acronyms but I soon gave up trying to memorize them. It’s a very good thing there’s a glossary at the end of the book and I would have been totally lost without it. I just wish I had noticed it from the start because I was about half way through when I saw it.

I’m in two minds how I feel about Oscar Britton. At times I couldn’t follow he’s reasoning and he couldn’t make his mind if the SOC are bad guys or not going from one opinion to another. He seemed to make huge amount of collateral damage and seemed indifferent to it. But I did like seeing how he grew and changed when he tried to adapt to his new life and trying to learn to use the magic.

This was out of my comfort zone with all the army stuff but it’s still great debut from the author. My struggle with the terms and acronyms lessened my enjoyment little bit but I’m happy I got a chance to read this. It was definitely different from what I’ve ever read.

[turkcebkf · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

A must read for Military and Urban Fantasy readers
However not a masterpiece it can be
This is an interesting book. I liked the premise a lot, I wanted it to be better, but execution wasn't that good. The main character wasn't well written.

Oscar Britton was a soldier than he was an outcast and through his story we learn about magical awakening and USA's approach to magic. From the beginning the USA looks like evil. Then with a lot of effort by the writer Britton looks to them more favorably. That was where book start to loose me. I couldn't understand why Britton acts like that. It takes me to the main question "How can USA citiziens let their army do these stuff. Are all latents from poor families, aren't they loved by anyone? Can a country and more importantly USA become that army controlled? Through all this the confusion is fueled by Myke Cole's writing. This isn't showing the grayes, I wasn't looking for black and white. But there should be a consistancy or a reason to change for charachters. There was none.

Because of this forced charachter changes, the book lost a lot of its power. However I'm sure Myke Cole will write the next book much better. This is afterall a promising first book from a new author. you should read it and wait for the next book in this series. Maybe we'll see more Military Fantasy like Control Point.