The New Girl

by Daniel Silva
475 pgs  (Gabriel Allon series #19)

When the daughter of Khalid bin Mohammed, the crown prince of Saudi Arabia, disappears, the prince reaches out indirectly to the one person who he knows would be able to find her, the man who also happens to be the least likely person who should be willing to help. But Gabriel Allon, the head of Israeli Intelligence, recognizes the potential opportunity this presents. He knows that if he's able to successfully find and return Khalid's daughter to him, that the Prince could become an invaluable ally in that influential Muslim country, an ally who could be instrumental to operations for decades to come.

Daniel Silva's books have always been good, but the last few have been exceptional. They've represented a new high for the series (now 19 books in) and The New Girl continues on that trajectory. It's fantastic.

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

The Other Woman

by Daniel Silva
476 pgs  (Gabriel Allon series #18)

There's a mole in Britain's MI6, and not one merely within the ranks of the intelligence officers. This mole is among those of the highest levels of power within the agency.

The Other Woman begins with a rescue operation. A Russian agent, whom Israel's intelligence division turned years ago, and who had been providing valuable information for years, has been blown and needs to be brought to the U.K. for sanctuary. But the operation goes bad and it soon becomes clear that someone within MI6 tipped the Russians off. It's up to Gabriel Allon to root out who that someone is and hold him or her accountable.

It's good to see Allon back on the front lines of the action again. In the last couple books, he's been behind the desk orchestrating the operation, but this time he's back carrying it out.

The Other Woman is a great example of why Silva's series has such staying power with me. His plots are fascinating and complex, and the action and intelligence tactics keep me turning the pages.

An interesting real-life event from the 1960s plays a role in this book, and some familiarity with it adds valuable context to Silva's story. In 1963, Kim Philby, a British intelligence agent, defected to the Soviet Union. It was soon learned that he had been working as a double agent for years.

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

House of Spies

by Daniel Silva
526 pgs  (Gabriel Allon series #17)

House of Spies, the 17th book in Daniel Silva's "Gabriel Allon" series, picks up right where The Black Widow left off. Saladin, the ISIS terrorist who has so far managed to stay one step ahead of Gabriel and his team, has successfully attacked Washington D.C., and as this book begins, he successfully attacks London. Gabriel, and his counterparts at the CIA and MI6 have only a couple of clues to follow in their efforts to stop him before he's able to attack again.

Gabriel's investigation leads him to Morocco, to a drug kingpin and arms dealer named Jean-Luc Martel. Martel's girlfriend Olivia Watson runs an art gallery, which is used to launder Martel's money. It's Martel who provided Saladin with the weapons used in London and Gabriel must devise a plan to use him and Olivia to get to Saladin.

While House of Spies isn't the best book in the series, it's a fine entry. It's definitely not the book to start with if you're unfamiliar with the series, especially because it's a direct continuation of the last one. But as a fan of the series, I enjoyed it and look forward to reading the next one.

★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆

The Black Widow

by Daniel Silva
528 pgs  (Gabriel Allon series #16)

I’ve enjoyed every one of Daniel Silva’s books featuring Gabriel Allon, the Israeli intelligence officer now slated to become the next chief of Israel’s intelligence service. But I don’t think I’ve enjoyed any of them as much as I did The Black Widow. For the last few books, I’ve wondered whether the series would lose some of its appeal once Gabriel finally made the transition to running operations from behind a desk at The Office instead of being an operative in the field. If this book is any indication of what’s in store, my fears have been alleviated.

The book begins with a bomb exploding in Paris, in an area known for its large Jewish population, followed soon after by another one in Amsterdam. One of the victims of the Paris attack had personal ties to Gabriel, which delays his announcement as chief of Israeli intelligence service, and compels him to run the operation after the mastermind of both operations, a former Iraqi officer now calling himself Saladin.

Gabriel and his team begin laying out the groundwork for an operation, an operation bolder than any they’ve pulled off before. They want to insert a Jew into ISIS. Their plan is to find a woman and transform her into a radical Islamist who ISIS will then recruit into the caliphate. It’s the only way they believe they can track Saladin’s movements and stop him before he’s able to carry out his next attack, this time in the U.S.  

This was an entertaining, compelling, and ultimately, unsettling story. Silva’s stories have often seemed inspired by real-world events, but this time it was eerie just how spot on he was. In the book’s foreward, Silva had this to say, “I commenced work on this novel before the Islamic terrorist group known as ISIS carried out a wave of shootings and bombings in Paris and Brussels that left more than 160 people dead. After briefly considering setting aside the typescript, I chose to complete it as originally conceived. . . . I take no pride in my prescience. I only wish that the murderous, millenarian terrorism of the Islamic State lived solely on the pages of this story.”

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

The English Spy

by Daniel Silva
485 pgs  (Gabriel Allon series #15)

Eamon Quinn is a mercenary, who was once the Irish Republican Army's top bomb maker. He's also the man who--many years ago--created the bomb that killed Gabriel Allon's son and left his first wife severely damaged, both physically and mentally. The book begins in typical Silva fashion, with an explosion aboard a yacht. The explosion kills a member of the British Monarchy, and the subsequent investigation quickly identifies Quinn to be the creator of the bomb. Allon is brought in to search for Quinn and soon discovers that his involvement in the investigation is exactly what the men behind the bombing wanted.

A group of Russian spies is trying to kill Allon for recently destroying their plot to obtain oil rights in the North Sea. They are successful in detonating another bomb, which they believe kills Allon. But they will eventually learn that the reports of his death were greatly exaggerated.

Once again Silva demonstrates why he's one of the best writing spy thrillers today. His plots are sophisticated and intricate, and his stories always seem to be extremely timely, and sometimes, even prescient. he's also able to incorporate a lot of emotion through Allon, Repeatedly exposing the emotional wounds his lifetime of hunting down and killing the worst of society has inflicted on himself and those he's closest to.

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

The Night Manager

by John le Carré
429 pgs

John le Carré is one of those authors who has been writing for a long time, whom I’ve often thought I should read one of his books, but for whatever reason, never seemed to get around to picking one up. It wasn’t until I watched the mini-series adaptation of The Night Manager, which recently aired on AMC, that I was finally motivated enough to pick up one of his books and bump it up to the top of my “to-be-read” pile.

The Night Manager is a story about two men. Both are refined and well-polished. Jonathan Pine is a former British intelligence operative who has made a life for himself after his military service working as the night manager at one of the top hotels in Zurich. Richard Roper is a British arms merchant, operating in the Bahamas, selling weapons on a massive scale to the highest bidders. He’s formed a world-wide network of shell companies to operate behind, and has surrounded himself with a protective retinue of former agents and operatives, who have kept him beyond the reach of the CIA and its counterpart in the UK.

The two men’s paths cross late one snowy night when Roper, his mistress, and a dozen or so others who protect him and his interests check in to Pine’s hotel. Pine knows of Roper, and considers him “the worst man in the world.” Pine used to be in love with a woman who came to know too much about Roper and his operations, and who paid the ultimate price because of it.

Pine resolves to find a way to expose Roper and if possible, to dismantle his extensive operations. Working with U.S. handlers, he devises a way to insert himself into Roper’s inner circle and begins to feed his handlers with information that may one day bring Roper down.

The book was enjoyable. Le Carré used to work for the British Secret Intelligence Service and his background is evident in the level of detail he works into his story. But I struggled with the pacing and excitement level of the book. Even near the end, when spy stories usually get to the point where I can’t put them down, I never felt that way with this one. I’ll probably try a few more of his books eventually. Maybe some of his earlier ones dealing with the Cold War. But this one didn’t make me want to rush to read his entire back catalog.

★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆

The Heist

by Daniel Silva
496 pgs  (Gabriel Allon series #14)

In this latest offering in Daniel Silva’s Gabriel Allon series, Allon is called on to find the killer of an English diplomat named Jack Bradshaw. Julian Isherwood, an art dealer, and long-time associate of Allon, discovered the body of Bradshaw and is now being held as a suspect in his murder. Bradshaw, it has been learned, has been secretly trafficking priceless pieces of art stolen from museums and churches around the world for years and selling it to an unknown collector. The Italian police have threatened to accuse Isherwood of Bradshaw’s murder unless Allon is able to discover the identity of the true killer.

Allon soon discovers that Bradshaw’s murder is connected to the disappearance of Caravaggio’s famous, and long-lost masterpiece The Nativity with St. Francis and St. Lawrence. Stolen in 1969 from the Sicilian church it had hung in for centuries, The Nativity has become one of the most famous and valuable missing pieces of art in history.   

In order for Allon to find the killer and free his friend, he must track down the masterpiece and uncover this mysterious and powerful art collector. As the story unfolds, and Allon and his team of Israeli operatives devise a plan to draw out the collector, Silva’s strengths as a storyteller are evidenced.

This is the 14^th book in the Allon series, and remarkably, Silva continues to keep the series as fresh and captivating as ever.

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

The English Girl

by Daniel Silva
482 pgs  (Gabriel Allon series #13)

When the mistress of the British Prime Minister is abducted and a ransom of £10MM is demanded within one week or she dies and the Prime Minister's discretions are exposed, MI5 turns to its friend at Israeli Intelligence, Gabriel Allon to try to find her and bring her back quietly and alive. All they have to go off of is a sketchy description of a man she met while vacationing in Corsica shortly before her disappearance. It's a job that will require all of Allon's team's expertise and skills to accomplish. Their investigation takes them to Russia, and points them towards a former KGB agent whom they believe orchestrated her disappearance on behalf of very wealthy and powerful interests there.

I've mentioned this before but it bears repeating, Daniel Silva is one of the few authors I've read who have been able to consistently put out new stories featuring the same central character, without the stories becoming stale or repetitive. The English Girl is the thirteenth book featuring Gabriel Allon, and it, like its predecessors, is great.

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

The Fallen Angel

by Daniel Silva
(Gabriel Allon series #12)

One of the measures of a good author is consistency, and by that standard, Daniel Silva is fantastic. The Fallen Angel is another excellent book in Silva's series featuring Gabriel Allon.

I've mentioned before how a series of books featuring the same characters will oftentimes get old and stale for me. Silva's Allon books have definitely not suffered that same trend. Even though each one tends to start the same--with Gabriel beginning the process of restoring some priceless painting by an Italian master, and getting pulled back into his former life as an Israeli intelligence officer, the field operation that he ends up leading is original and captivating.

This time it's a painting by Caravaggio that he's restoring for the Vatican when he's summoned to St. Peter's Basilica by the secretary to the Pope to examine the body of a woman lying dead from an apparent suicide jump from high up inside the dome. It's clear to Gabriel that the woman has been murdered, and his investigation into her death places him in the crosshairs of terrorists who have been stealing masterpieces to finance their operations.

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

Portrait of a Spy

by Daniel Silva
(Gabriel Allon series #11)

The problem I have with authors who write a series of books featuring a recurring character, is oftentimes the books get repetitive, the characters get stale, and I lose interest in the author altogether. I used to read the Alex Cross books by Patterson and the Alex Delaware books by Kellerman. But it's been several years now since I read a book by either writer and frankly, I have no plans to read one again.

The Gabriel Allon books however, by Daniel Silva have been the exception to the rule for me. The Portrait of a Spy is the 11th installment in Silva's series featuring the Israeli art restorer/former intelligence operative and it was as enjoyable, if not more so, than all of its predecessors.

In this one, Gabriel is brought back into action after a day consisting of multiple terrorist attacks across Europe takes place. One attack occurs in Paris, one in Copenhagen, and a third one, right in front of Gabriel in a crowded marketplace in London. The attacks were planned and directed by the new leader of Muslim extremists and the timing of the attacks coincides with the exact times the three planes hit their targets on 9/11.

Silva doesn't simply tell stories using the conflict in the Middle East as their backdrop. He clearly has a deep and an extensive understanding of what's going on in that region of the world and he uses that knowledge and his storytelling abilities to write books that are more than just entertaining, they're insightful. Each time I read one of his books, I feel like I come away with both a greater awareness of the volativity in that part of the world and an appreciation for the importance of finding a solution to the conflict.

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

Carte Blanche

Carte Blanche by Jeffery Deaver

I’ve never read one of Ian Flemming’s James Bond books. So I can't speak to whether Deaver stayed true to the character as it was written by Flemming. I've seen almost all of the movies though. (Except for that one with the guy that no one can ever remember his name.) I was first introduced to Bond while on a family vacation when I was eleven or twelve years old. My dad rented Octopussy and let me watch it. I thought it was fantastic!. It had great stunts, fast-paced action, gadgets every boy would die for, and having just entered the stage of life where girls were of interest to me, it was perfect timing. With it being my first exposure to Bond, I had no idea that it was one of the worst Bond movies ever made, Nor was I aware that there had been a much better James Bond before Roger Moore. Nevertheless, I had discovered the character and 26 years later, I still look forward to every new Bond movie that comes out. 

When I learned that Jeffery Deaver, an author I've read quite devotedly, had been commissioned to write the next Bond story, I became anxious to read my first one. I was interested to see how an author, notorious for writing unexpected twists into his stories, was going to write a James Bond story - where there's usually a pretty set formula: An evil genius, set on world domination, is foiled because instead of killing James Bond quickly and cleanly when he had the chance, decides to reveal the details of his plan to Bond and then take off - sure in his mind that there's no way Bond will ever escape the shark tank/conveyor belt slowly delivering Bond to his death/pilotless airplane seconds away from crashing/etc. Deaver didn't disappoint.

I went to a book signing last year for Deaver's last book and he discussed the upcoming Bond book. He described how he wanted to take the character back to what Ian Flemming first created, and then place him in today's world. Which is exactly what he did. In Carte Blanche Bond has only been a 00 agent for three years when it's discovered that next Friday night, thousands of people are going to die in some sort of attack. It's up to Bond to discover who is behind the attack, where it's going to take place, how it's to be done, and then to prevent it, all in a very short period of time. Having listened to Deaver describe Bond as he was first written into existence, before anyone played him on film (even the good Bond actors) and now having read a book, I'm much more interested in going back to Flemming's books and giving them a try.

★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆

The Rembrandt Affair

by Daniel Silva
(Gabriel Allon series #10)

In this, his tenth book featuring Gabriel Allon - the reclusive art restorer and wannabe former Israeli intelligence officer - Daniel Silva uses Allon's love of the master painters to once again draw him out of seclusion and back into his former life.

A previously unknown painting by Rembrandt, lost during the Jewish holocaust, has surfaced. But before most of the world is even aware of its existence, it quickly disappears again. The art restorer who is cleaning it and preparing it to be seen by the world, is brutally murdered and the portrait by Rembrandt is taken. Allon reluctantly decides to assist his long-time acquaintance Julian Isherwood, who was responsible for the painting when it was stolen, in its recovery.

In classic Silva style, what initially appears to be Allon's task, is quickly revealed as only the tip of the iceberg. The painting's disappearance leads to the son of a former SS Officer and then to a Swiss billionaire, who the world believes to be one of the greatest philanthropists ever, but who might have ties to the country that poses the largest threat to Israel today - Iran.

Daniel Silva has yet to disappoint me with one of his books. This year I timed our family's trip to visit my wife's family in Colorado to coincide with the Denver stop on his book tour and I'm glad I did. Mr. Silva is as interesting to listen to as his books are to read. The insights he provided on his research for this and other books he's written were fascinating and I'm looking forward to reading his next installment in the series.

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

The Scorpio Illusion

The Scorpio Illusion by Robert Ludlum


This book was amazing. I've read nine other Ludlum books, and enjoyed them all - especially the Jason Bourne series. What amazed me about this book however, was how remarkably awful it was. Ludlum is fortunate that he had written 18 well-received books prior to this one. If this had been the first book he had submitted to his publishers, his obituary would have mentioned his life-long career as a CPA rather than a novelist because he never would have been published.

The plot sounds like a classic Ludlum thriller - an extremist with a personal vendetta against the U.S. and other democracies plots to destabilize their governments by orchestrating the simultaneous assassinations of the U.S. President, along with the heads of states for France, England and Israel. Unfortunately Ludlum's plot and dialogue are so distractingly bad that any redeeming qualities in the book are overshadowed. I think I have a form of OCD which forces me to finish any book I start no matter how much I dislike the book. By about page 35 of this book I was envious of those people who can simply close a book and move on.

★ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆