NICK CARTER: TEMPLE OF FEAR

So, I sorted through my grocery bag of Nick Carter to get rid of all the ones told in first person. Just a personal preference and I don't like them.
There were a lot.
I may reconsider, but for now I have about a baker's dozen of them told in third person.
TEMPLE OF FEAR is a pretty gruesome tale. Nick's boss, Hawk is hired  to eliminate a double agent that ran to Russia to escape persecution. Apparently he will be in Japan to assasinate the Emperor, but no one knows that.
In the meantime, Nick is visited by four undercover, Japanese Girl Scouts who are charged wit bringing Nick back to Japan to repay a debt of honor. And, no I am not making this up. Sure, they turn out to be hot, Japanese women, but it's still pretty funny.
Now Nick is off the grid, weaponless and working under the assumed name of a dead journalist who is offered the biggest news story of all time.
If he can live long enough to complete the assignment.
This was a lot of fun. The author decided to make the Oriental bad guys just the worst kind of human beings with no regard to life. The sickest thing is when Nick, locked in a cell is delivered the head of one of the girl scouts and he uses the oil in her hair to slip his handcuffs off to escape.
That might be the coldest stunt I have seen Carter do so far.
I have noticed that the books all seem to move at a leisurely pace until there's about twenty pages left. Then it's like the writer said, 'Whoops! Hitting the word count limit, better wrap it up!" It goes fast.
This was a pretty good entry in the series.