From Publishers Weekly
Lustbader fans will herald the coming of this latest adventure in the astonishingly turbulent life of half-Asian, half-Caucasian, all-hero fighting machine Nicholas Linnear. Newcomers to the author's idiosyncratic work, however, may have trouble getting with this sequel to The Kaisho , which not only features the usual heaping doses of violence, sex and Japanese mysticism but requires pages of difficult exposition to recap the story thus far, which hooks on high-tech shenanigans. The novel opens with a trademark example of Lustbader's eroticized violence, as a Vietnam vet in 1983 Burma struggles to maintain his foothold among the nation's drug lords and exacts a deliciously nasty vengeance against a bitter enemy. Leap to the present and Linnear, soon trapped in Saigon's famed underground tunnels with only his " tanjian eye "--some sort of sensory enhancement that is mentioned all too often--to guide and protect him. Meanwhile, back in the U.S., Linnear's old friend, ex-NYPD detective Lew Croaker, is also on the case, unleashing his prosthetic hand, complete with retractable claws and powered by lithium batteries, whenever the occasion arises. And so the wildly improbable but amazingly energetic action goes, from Washington to Tokyo and back to Vietnam, with periodic flashbacks thrown in, as well as a mobster nicknamed "Bad Clams" and a drug-lord named "Rock," until it reaches not a conclusion but a setup for the next Linnear thriller (" So it's not over , Vesper thought. It's just beginning "). This is the kind of novel that fans of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles read when they grow up--and no one does it with more punch than Lustbader. Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
Nicholas Linnear is back on a manhunt for the killer of Vincent Tinh, a director in his company, Sate International. At the same time, he is looking for his friend Okami, head of a Japanese underworld clan, who has asked for Linnear's help. Assisted by pal Lew Croaker, Linnear probes the underbelly of Southeast Asia, focusing on the Floating City, a secret empire where Tinh's murderer is hiding and where the key to Okami's trouble lies. In an action-packed finale, Linnear avenges Tinh's death and narrowly escapes a nuclear blast. Full of passages describing Japanese culture and history, this work continues the saga of Linnear, a man as comfortable in the East as he is in the West. The numerous Japanese terms will confound neophyte Lustbader readers, but veteran fans will appreciate this richly detailed, if slow-moving, novel. Public libraries of all sizes will want this best-selling author's latest offering.-- Grant A. Fredericksen, Illinois Prairie Dist. P.L., MetamoraCopyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
What do you get when you mix the Mafia, Yakuza, warlords of the Asian heroin industry, political scandal and economic disaster in Japan, ninjas and meganinjas, corrupt governments, stone killers left over from Vietnam, and even a bit of mysticism and telekinesis? An Eric Lustbader novel. Once again Nicholas Linnear and his private-eye buddy, Lew Croaker, dash around the globe attempting to thwart the murder of the Yakuza boss of bosses and stop the development of a terrible new weapon and a supercartel bent on world domination. Lustbader may have reasoned that borrowing a figurative page from Robert Ludlum, Mario Puzo, Trevanian, Paul Erdmann, Tom Clancy, and every other successful thriller writer of the last two decades is the recipe for best-sellers. Judging by the ubiquity of his books, he's been right, but Floating City isn't compelling. There are too many characters to keep track of and too much over-the-top, mystical-meganinja nonsense. There's also too little mayhem, and what there is is written more flatly than in earlier Linnears. Even so, Lustbader fans will come to the library seeking it, so you better have it. Thomas Gaughan

From Kirkus Reviews
The world's a perilous place indeed, full of moral ambiguity and inscrutable Asian mystique, in Lustbader's (Black Blade, 1993, etc.) second installation of the Kaisho series. While piecing together clues of an international criminal bombing plot, Nicholas Linnear must locate Mikio Okami, the Japanese Mafia godfather he finds morally reprehensible but has sworn to his father to protect. Okami is in hiding because most of the other characters want him dead. His closest Japanese associates want to move past petty business profits and arms sales into drug trafficking. American mobster ``Bad Clams'' Leonforte has an unhealthy interest in tracking Okami, possibly because he is the adversary of Okami's former partner, the brutally murdered Dominic Goldoni, or because he is involved with Senator Dedalus, who coordinates illegal arms trades from a Washington, DC, strip joint. Linnear pursues the Asian connection and, while there, an old flame, while his pal Lew Croaker sleuths in the States, a job that includes tailing Goldoni's sister, Margarite, with whom, if that don't beat all, he's in love. Occasional telephone conversations between Linnear and Croaker recap their progress in tracing Okami and digging up the details on Torch, a powerful, portable nuclear weapon scheduled to detonate in some unspecified city. Until then, it is housed with its creator, a Russian cyberneticist and defector, in Floating City, the Vietnamese stronghold of Rock, an American veteran who had too much fun firing his missile launcher to ever leave Vietnam. While mingling with these politicians and gangsters, the heroes rely upon their unique resources: Linnear upon his tanjian--a psychic discipline that converts thought into action--and Croaker upon his biomechanical, titanium-sheathed left hand. Honorable bad guys and elaborate secrets mingle with the usual senseless violence and sensual, exploited Asian women. Whoever makes it to the end of this entangled thriller will find that the loose ends make the next Linnear installment a must-read. -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Review
Chris Chase Cosmopolitan Strong female characters -- rare in action tales -- and sex galore.

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