Engaging and deftly paced, another thoughtfully entertaining summer read from Silva.
A legendary spy takes a vacation—or tries to, anyway—in Silva’s 20th Gabriel Allon novel.
Gabriel is trying to enjoy some rest and relaxation with his family in Venice when he learns that an old friend has died. As it happens, this old friend was Pope Paul VII, and it’s not long before Allon is summoned by the pontiff’s personal secretary. Archbishop Luigi Donati has reason to believe that the Holy Father did not die a natural death. For each of the past several summers, Silva has delivered a thriller that seems to be ripped from the headlines. This latest book feels, at first, like something of a throwback. Palace intrigue at the Vatican might seem quaint compared to Islamist extremism or Russia’s rise as an international influence, but Silva makes it relevant and compelling. Allon discovers that the most likely culprits in the death of the pope are connected to far-right leaders throughout Europe, and the rediscovery of a lost Gospel sheds new light on Christian anti-Semitism. The villains here are Catholic traditionalists—Silva’s imaginary Paul VII looks a lot like the real-life Francis I—and “populist” politicians who appeal to nativist, anti-globalist sympathies. As Silva looks at European contempt for a new wave of immigrants from Africa, the Middle East, and Asia, he finds a model for this xenophobia in ancient hatred of the Jewish people, an antipathy that has its roots in the New Testament. He interjects a few Bible studies lessons and offers a bit of history as background; these passages add depth without impeding the forward momentum of the plot. Readers familiar with this series may notice the evolution of a motif introduced a few novels ago: In the world of Gabriel Allon, the United States has receded from relevance on the world stage.
Engaging and deftly paced, another thoughtfully entertaining summer read from Silva.Pub Date: July 14, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-06-283484-3
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: June 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2020
Skillfully built tension will keep the pages turning.
When a man disappears under suspicious circumstances, a young couple tries to cover their involvement while his wife begins to wonder what they know.
When Christian Scott returns home to find his wife, Lily, upset and scared, he assumes at first that she's had another miscarriage. Instead, Lily shares with him a horrific story: While she was taking a walk at a nearby nature preserve, she'd run into Jake Hayes, the husband of her friend and fellow teacher Nina, and he dragged her into the forest and tried to rape her. She'd only escaped by hitting him on the head with a rock. This sets up the major conflict of the novel: Christian and Lily must try to cover Lily’s tracks in case the head wound turned out to be fatal. Nina and Jake had had a fight the night before, so Nina isn't surprised that she doesn't hear from him at first, but as she begins to realize Jake is missing and then goes to the police, she has no idea that Christian and Lily are working behind the scenes to protect Lily. Eventually she notices that something is wrong with their behavior, though, and she vacillates between investigating them and retreating to her mother's comforting arms. The chapters are divided between Christian's and Nina’s first-person perspectives, and the entire action unfurls after the crime has presumably been committed, which adds an intriguing layer to the suspense. There isn't much of a focus on the victim, as we never get to know Jake except through other people’s reminiscences. Instead, the possible suspects take center stage. The only weakness here is a common one in Kubica’s thrillers: The solution, when it comes, seems a somewhat unearned misdirection, but in this case, it also serves as a reminder that some characters are, as some people are, more invisible than others.
Skillfully built tension will keep the pages turning.Pub Date: Jan. 10, 2023
ISBN: 9780778333111
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Park Row Books
Review Posted Online: Feb. 22, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2023
Fans willing to accept a big reveal that’s only medium-sized will revel in a superior thriller.
A rookie fellow in forensic pathology discovers a secret that turns her into her own most riveting case study.
Sloan Hastings has always known that Raleigh dentist Dolly Hastings and orthodontist Todd Hastings aren’t her biological parents. But it’s not until she submits a DNA sample to an online site in support of her assigned research in investigative genealogy that she discovers how closely it matches the DNA of Nevada photographer Nora Davies Margolis, who’s active on genealogical sites. In fact, Sloan learns, she herself is almost certainly Charlotte Margolis, who disappeared from Cedar Creek along with her birth parents, newlyweds Preston and Annabelle Margolis, nearly 30 years ago. Following the DNA trail Sloan’s now made publicly available, Cedar Creek Sheriff Eric Stamos—whose father, Sheriff Sanford Stamos, was found dead under highly suspicious circumstances back in 1995—comes east to convince Sloan that the vanishing of her infant self and her parents was the reason Sandy Stamos was killed and the true details of his decease suppressed by the all-powerful Margolis clan; that both mysteries are tied to the case Sandy was investigating when he died—the apparent hit-and-run death of Margolis law firm partner Baker Jauncey; and that Sloan’s search for her birth parents would make her the perfect candidate to go undercover in the Margolis closet and root out its skeletons. Zigzagging mercilessly between past and present, Donlea keeps up the tension long after you’ve decided that it really doesn’t matter who killed Baker Jauncey and Sandy Stamos as long as Sloan learns the truth and comes out of this lethal maze intact.
Fans willing to accept a big reveal that’s only medium-sized will revel in a superior thriller.Pub Date: May 21, 2024
ISBN: 9781496727183
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Kensington
Review Posted Online: March 9, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2024
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