Liberty's Last Stand

President Barry Soetoro, the villain of bestseller Coonts's provocative thriller, is due to leave office in five months when he uses a convenient terrorist attack to declare martial law, adjourn Congress, suspend the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, and become the dictator of the United States. He fires CIA director Jake Grafton (last seen in 2013's Pirate Alley) and throws him in a federal detention center in West Virginia along with hundreds of conservative politicians and political commentators. Grafton's ex-CIA pal, Tommy Carmellini (also last seen in Pirate Alley), decides he's going to bust his old boss out of jail. Meanwhile, Texas secedes from the union and begins seizing U.S. military bases. Soetoro's opponents have a long list of gripes: he's a "self-proclaimed black messiah," "Soetorocare" is a disaster, and EPA regulations are "designed to save the climate at the expense of the working men and women of Texas." Coonts's excellent action scenes, which shift between Tommy's jailbreak scheme and the civil war with Texas, grind to a halt as characters stop to give fervent speeches about freedom. Those who don't care for Obama or his policies will find a lot to like. Agent: Deborah C. Grosvenor, Grosvenor Literary Agency. (June)