The Dragon Factory »

Jonathan Maberry is the multiple Bram Stoker Award-winning author of Ghost Road Blues (Pinnacle Books, 2006), first of a trilogy of thrillers with a supernatural bite. He is a professional writer and writing teacher and since 1979 has sold more than 1100 articles, seventeen nonfiction books, six novels, as well as short stories, poetry, song lyrics, video scripts, and two plays. In 2004, Jonathan was inducted into the International Martial Arts Hall of Fame largely because of his extensive writings in that field. 

Joe Ledger and the DMS (Department of Military Sciences) go up against two competing groups of geneticists. One side is creating exotic transgenic monsters and genetically enhanced mercenary armies; the other is using 21st century technology to continue the Nazi Master Race program begun by Josef Mengele. Both sides want to see the DMS destroyed, and they've drawn first blood. Neither side is prepared for Joe Ledger as he leads Echo Team to war under a black flag.

Publishers Weekly

In Stoker-winner Maberry’s wild second Joe Ledger novel (after Patient Zero), Joe and his comrades from the Department of Military Science (DMS) take on enough villains and their world-threatening plots to fill half a dozen ordinary thrillers. The dangers Joe and his Echo Team warriors confront include evil boy-girl albino twins born on Christmas, “each child marked with a star like the Star of Bethlehem”; weaponized genetic diseases; the Cabal, whose goal is worldwide ethnic cleansing; Nazi clones; a race of slaves called New Men; a wide array of mythical beasts (unicorns, centaurs, dragons, elves, etc.); and morphogenetic monsters such as tiger/dogs and insect/humans. Joe battles these horrors with his usual ferocity, but by the end, even this superhero is reduced to despair by the toll the job exacts. While Joe has announced his retirement, eager readers can look forward to one more volume in this humorous, over-the-top cross-genre trilogy. (Mar.)