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A Lonely Resurrection
A Lonely Resurrection
A Lonely Resurrection
Audiobook9 hours

A Lonely Resurrection

Written by Barry Eisler

Narrated by Barry Eisler

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

4/5

()

About this audiobook

Previously published as Hard Rain and Blood from Blood

All John Rain wants is to get out of the killing business. But with his discretion, his reliability, and his unique talent for death by “natural causes,” no one is willing to let him just retire. So when an old nemesis from the Japanese national police force comes to him with a new job—eliminate Murakami, a killer even more fearsome than Rain himself—he can’t refuse.

Aided by an achingly desirable half Brazilian, half Japanese exotic dancer he knows he shouldn’t trust, Rain pursues his quarry through underground no-holds-barred fight clubs, mobbed-up hostess bars, and finally into the heart of a shadow war between the CIA and the yakuza. It’s a war Rain can’t win, but also one he can’t afford to lose—a war where the distinctions between friend and foe and truth and deceit are as murky as the rain-slicked streets of Tokyo.

A Lonely Resurrection was previously published as Hard Rain in the US and Blood From Blood in the UK, the second in the bestselling John Rain assassin series.

LanguageEnglish
Release dateFeb 11, 2014
ISBN9781480553163
A Lonely Resurrection
Author

Barry Eisler

Barry Eisler spent three years in a covert position with the CIA’s Directorate of Operations, then worked as a technology lawyer and startup executive in Silicon Valley and Japan, earning his black belt at the Kodokan Judo Institute along the way. Eisler’s bestselling thrillers have won the Barry Award and the Gumshoe Award for Best Thriller, have been included in numerous “Best of” lists, have been translated into nearly twenty languages, and include the #1 bestseller Livia Lone. Eisler lives in the San Francisco Bay Area and, when he’s not writing novels, blogs about torture, civil liberties, and the rule of law. Learn more at www.barryeisler.com.

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Reviews for A Lonely Resurrection

Rating: 4.039808841401274 out of 5 stars
4/5

314 ratings18 reviews

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  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    You start feeling for some of the characters. The author also narrates. The voice works well!
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A great audible read! Walking, driving, working out—it was perfect. The underlying storyline and character development art excellent, interesting, crisp and fast moving. The subtext exposure to Japanese history and culture—-the sociology, values, generational conflicts; all well done. Rain is reflective, justifiably violent— but somehow also a beacon of ethics & justice. The martial arts descriptions, sequences and styles were realistic. As a long time martial arts student, I appreciated that. Eisner also obviously enjoys narrating his own stuff and that adds a spark to the narration.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Brilliant, sexy, highly nuanced and gripping storytelling. Read so well too by the author himself.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Eisler’s Rain novels are action-packed page turners that make you feel as though you’ve actually visited Tokyo. As an assassin, Rain is cold-blooded, but as a narrator he wears his heart on his sleeve. Despite the fact that the plot of this one is a bit muddled, it still moves like a Bourne film and you’ll find yourself on the edge of your seat. It’s best to read the books in the order they were written, but it’s not essential (this is book #2). I look forward to the day when one of them actually turns into a movie (they’ve been optioned).
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Awesome sequel! Barry is an excellent writer and narrator. Definitely a level up from your typical assassin series. Creative descriptions, thorough characters,
    relatable emotions, informative without being pretentious... Oh yeah and it has badass action sequences too.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I just can't get enough of these pulpy Japanese assassin turned good guy books. Even though they aren't exactly classic literature they're still fun and easy to read. I love the setting and all the little details, even if the writing isn't amazing. I look forward to devouring the next one and seeing how John Rain's semi-crusade against corrupt politicians continues to unfold.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This is a really great read. I highly recommend it. If you haven't read the first John Rain thriller, " A Clean Kill In Tokyo,," I advise you to
    open that up first. It gives a lot of background as to who Rain is, who Harry is, and who Midori is. This book picks up where the first leaves
    off. John Rain is an a former Vietnam War commando who grew up in both Japan and in the states. He is also a deadly assasin. The book
    details his life underground and the links from his past that lead him
    out into dangerous waters. There is spy stuff, political intrigue, judo,
    mixed martial arts, hostess clubs, and blackmail. It's John rain against the whole Tokyo underworld. As with the first Rain book, this one takes the reader on a journey into the depths of Tokyo, a place that I for the first time find fascinating.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    The book opens up more of John Rain's character, showing both his strengths and some more obvious weaknesses. It also closes several loose ends hanging over from previous books. We learn more about John Rain's ruthlessness, as well as which rules he's willing to bend, and which not. The plot gets complex near the end. You're left with enough "But what about this?" items to guarantee another episode. (At least I hope so!) If there's one downside of the book, perhaps a few of the supporting characters were not as believable as I'd expected. Overall, a very good read.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Quit good, especially compared to the others like it.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    The book is not well paced. In fact it sort of drags. Eisler enjoys using metaphor for describing the scenes around him. He does have a nice touch for it and you do get a good feeling for Toyko as he describes it to you. And he describes it a lot. I would have preferred less of background description, but that is a matter of taste.

    Eisler occasionally writes in excruciating step by step detail the various movements of his character. On the one hand, it is in keeping with the character who is an assassin and the narrator of the story. Assassins are notorious for being detailed to the nth degree. On the other hand, I didn't find it gripping narrative.

    An assassin's tale should be gripping. It is, after all, a thriller. Part of the lack of interest, for me anyway, was that I didn't find John Rain all that fascinating. I don't necessarily have to sympathize with him, although I think that is Eisler's intent. But it would be nice to all least feel compelled to know what happens to him next. I didn't.

    You never feel like Rain is in any danger of being in over his head. His fights are quick and without much of an underdog feeling, so when he eventually kills his foe, you mostly nod and move on to the next scene, without any cheering. Since Rain is an aging assassin, this could have so easily been turned into his weakness in a fight. The reason why he loses the occasional fight, why he almost dies but in the end turns it around for the win. But no. Rain is just really cold and really good and there never is much question that he is going to win. And do it quickly.

    The conspiracy was nicely convoluted. And the man behind the conspiracy is still alive and kicking at the end, so you do feel like you would like to see that next book in hopes of getting his ass "resolved". But Rain isn't particularly invested in resolving or exposing the conspiracy. He isn't motivated by ideals. He acts for the most part on equations of loss and gain. If the gain is greater, he acts. But in this book he is converted to act on emotion by the murder of a friend.

  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is the second novel in the series about Japanese-American Vietnam vet John Rain, a hired assassin for government agencies in Tokyo and Washington. I found it to be well written and was fascinated by the many details about Tokyo that it contained. I haven’t read any of the other titles in the series and probably won’t because it is darker and more violent than I like Rain knows entirely too much about the arts of killing and avoiding surveillance. There are many violent scenes in which a variety of weapons are used. Rain works with Tatsu, a veteran agent of Japan's FBI dedicated to battling high-level corruption and various shady American CIA agents, any of whom may or may not be trusted. Because he can’t trust anyone, Rain realizes how alone he really is, despite the interest of two very interesting (and of course, beautiful) women. The plot isn't quite as complicated as Rain is himself, but the author kept me guessing.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Meticulous John Rain leaves nothing to chance.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Stylish sequel to Rain Fall. Eisler's prose is, if anything, even more poetic in Hard Rain. We begin to care even more about John Rain and we feel some of his pain. The situations he finds himself in are handled skillfully by both Rain and Eisler.The political aspects of this thriller take some slick twists as part of the plot though they are probably handled the worst by Eisler. I got too much sense of "infodump" about Japanese politics at times rather than narrative discovery. Maybe Eisler has the same low opinion of most politicians that I do, lol. I would have liked to read more detail of the difference between bureaucrats as the evolution of samurai versus the politicians.Rain's love life is going to kill him some day but until then it helps make a thrilling read and continues to show a side of Rain beyond the thinking man's assassin. Some other habits are exposed as unhealthy for him as well.You start to wonder about the plans of his 'Japanese-FBI' friend Tatsu. Not just if he is Rain's friend but also if his approach to reforming Japanese politics has any thrust to it. And you also ask, does Rain need a master, as a modern samurai, or is he the masterless ronin he fancies himself to be?Yep, time to start reading book 3, Rainstorm. If you got this far so will you!
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    A well written spy thriller.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I didn't have high hopes for this book - I liked the first one but thought that the writer might not be able to follow-through with Rain's character. I was mistaken. This book is actually better than the first in the series.A lot of butt gets a lot of kicking and if someone deserves to die, they do! Easy-peasy lemon squeezey... none of this 'let's take him to court and see what happens with a jury of his peers'.Nope, just a bit of Rain slipping up behind him and quickly snapping his neck. All better now!!The only real drawback to the story (for me anyway) is that the entire plot is based on political maneuvering and international politics, etc... stuff I really don't care about.But, no worries, I just glazed over that talky-talky mumbo-jumbo until it got back on track with some butt-kicking.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This book centers around John Rain, an accomplished assassin who can kill remorselessly, but is psychologically open and very fragile. He tries to protect himself by not forming any attachments but at the same time is lonely. This tension exists throughout the book and is part of the reason that it is a good read. Take this personality and put it in a relentlessly moving plot, and then overlay it with a great description of the neighborhoods in the Tokyo area, and you have the recipe for a good ,fulfilling read.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    In many ways, Hard Rain is less a sequel to Rain Fall than it is a continuation of that story. Most sequels stand on their own; Hard Rain does not. If you haven't read Rain Fall then you will be absolutely lost for much of Hard Rain. The character of John Rain continues to develop in Hard Rain. He is an enjoyable character whom I certainly would not want angry with me. My largest criticism of Eisler's books is that Japanese/Tokyo travelogue; while it is interesting (and Tokyo is practically a character in the books), it occasionally gets a bit tedious, especially for a reader that has never been to Japan has a hard time envisioning some of the environs being described. But that is a minor criticism for an otherwise very enjoyable series of novels. I've already started reading the next John Rain novel.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Not as compelling as the first book in the series, Rain Fall. But John Rain, the assassin who specializes in "natural causes" kills, has some unfinished business from the last book that just won't leave him alone. This time he's mixed up with the yakuza, underground fighting, and a certain gentleman's club.