While performing some bodyguard duty for a couple of politicians running for election in the New Guinea highlands, Sergeant Tom Wilkes is confronted with a completely unexpected sight. His party is attacked by tribesmen armed not with spears, but with Kalashnikovs. Concern over how primitive warriors came to be so heavily armed leads him to follow the men back to their camp. What he finds is not really surprising. The tribesmen have been exchanging the abundant marijuana that grows around their camp for the guns.

Tom Wilkes is the SAS sergeant introduced to us in David A. Rollins' first book Rogue Element and he returns here more as an individual soldier rather than a leader of a crack fighting unit. As such, we get to know a lot more about him as a man rather than as a simple knight in shining armour figure.

Thanks to some camera work by Wilkes, the men trading the weapons for drugs are later identified as having terrorist links to a new terrorist organisation known as Babu Islam. Indeed, they are active members who are planning a major strike against the infidels of the west. The money they are getting from the drugs will fund their plans and the big concern is that they are quickly becoming very well funded.

The Australian Defense Minister, in concert with members of the CIA and the Australian military agree that the men whose images were captured by Wilkes should be apprehended as soon as possible. But they're not quick enough to avert the first powerful blow and the first demonstration of just how critical it is that they be caught.

The man chosen to capture the Babu Islam leaders, of course, is Sergeant Tom Wilkes and he is quickly recruited, taken through the expected operational procedures, and sent over to the hotbed of Palestine where one of the men was last seen. The hunt begins on the one hand while we learn the details of a planned devastating attack on the other, the classic race against time.

The story moves along in fits and starts, experiencing moments of all out action tempered by strategy meetings on the part of the Australian government or preparations and training at the Babu Islam camp or personal crises between Tom Wilkes and his girlfriend / fiance / ex-fiance.

As with many action adventure stories, particularly those containing the threat of terrorist attack and global annihilation, there is an ever present feeling of imminent danger and unpredictability. Every operation is organised and implemented without a moment to spare and, when someone is saved, it's always in the nick of time. Rather than suggesting that this edge of the seat facet of Sword of Allah is a hackneyed standard that is present in every action adventure thriller, it's more pointing out the type of adrenaline pumping, page-turning pace that attracts readers of this genre.

The wide-ranging global nature of the story necessitates that the author has undertaken a great deal of research to ensure that it is believable in both the setting and the local customs. Rollins has obviously done that research and every new location is brought to life with wholehearted flair. From Germany and Palestine, to Indonesia and Australia, each scene is spot on.

As for Tome Wilkes, he is given much greater depth of personality in Sword of Allah as he deals with relationship problems in between having to concentrate on life threatening missions. Consequently he becomes more of an everyday man rather and is much more easy to identify with as a result.

Sword of Allah is a strong second novel by David A. Rollins, another desperate modern thriller that applies current day fears on a global scale. The mounting threat of an imminent attack provides urgency and high stakes and the characters who were introduced in Rogue Element are given more depth. Readers of heart stopping thrillers should enjoy this book.