A review by markmtz
Phoenix Island by John Dixon

2.0

I picked up this novel after I learned it was the inspiration for a short-lived CBS television series, Intelligence. As it turns out, the book and the show have only one thing in common. The main character of each has a microchip implanted in his body. In the novel. it's not about the microchip, or "cheep", as the evil doctor, whose hobby is making kids "sing" with torture, calls it. It's about the sixteen year-old kid with a passion for boxing who has been manipulated into a vicious juvenile boot camp that secretly trains kids to be mercenaries for a megalomaniac out to remake the world to his own standards. The story is well-written but after finishing, I don't feel a need to continue in the series. Curiously, I think the television series would have been more interesting if it had adapted the novel instead of merely taking inspiration from it.