An engaging hostage tale with indelible characters.
In this thriller, a retired diplomat and former CIA agent hunts the kidnappers who’ve abducted his girlfriend for ransom.
Brooks Davidson, once a “top diplomat” in the Middle East, has become a successful investor there. It’s 2001, and he proposes an economic project in Cairo that many believe will triumph. But one man views the enterprise as a menace. Minister of Trade and Industry Omar Sayed, convinced the Egyptian president has bypassed his own commercial projects, vows to stifle Western capitalist influence in his country. But this may simply be a matter of revenge, as his ploy entails coercing Brooks into withdrawing from all his Middle Eastern business activities. Sayed, harboring ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, enlists men to kidnap Brooks’ wife in California, at which point the minister can demand a $2 million ransom. But Sayed doesn’t know that kidnap victim Sarah Pierce has only been dating Brooks for a few months and the two have no immediate plans to wed. As soon as Brooks sees the ransom note, he contacts old friends at the CIA and other government agencies. He moreover tries identifying the kidnappers; they’re obviously Middle Eastern, but he aims to pinpoint the specific country. Sarah’s abductors make it hard to track her, as they keep moving their hostage to different locations. In the meantime, Brooks holds off paying the kidnappers and continually demands proof of life. But if they think he’s stalling, they may cut their losses, which won’t likely include letting Sarah live.
Foran creates a relatively simple kidnapping plot. Sayed’s motive, for example, is quickly apparent, and his scheme wisely doesn’t involve too many players. But his actions are a bit muddled; along with killing Sarah, he threatens to expose Brooks’ “corrupt and treasonous activities.” As this charge is merely speculation—a deal Brooks made with the Egyptian president that Sayed guesses is unlawful—it holds little weight and pales next to Sarah’s potential murder. In the same vein, the titular flub changes nothing, since the fact that the two aren’t married diminishes neither the danger Sarah faces nor Brooks’ determination to get her home safely. The author devotes plenty of pages to the likable couple’s developing romance, from their meet-cute to their deepening feelings. Nevertheless, the story is at its best with Sarah as a hostage. Though the narrative moves at a measured pace, Sarah’s scenes are genuinely suspenseful, especially as time passes and Brooks and his colleagues seem no closer to finding her. She’s also exceptionally clever. For example, while blindfolded, she tries to decipher where she is by engaging her olfactory sense, counting her steps, and striking up conversations with her captors. She also ensures that the male kidnappers keep their hands off her by claiming the penicillin pills she’s taking for pneumonia are actually tuberculosis meds. As the abduction takes place in the summer of 2001, references to an impending, real-world tragedy only months later are predictable. Fortunately, they’re subtle nods, all part of Foran’s smart infusion of history in his fictional narrative.
An engaging hostage tale with indelible characters.Pub Date: Sept. 28, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-61468-650-7
Page Count: 370
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Dec. 6, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A rather flat entry in a generally excellent series.
The 25th novel featuring Silva’s legendary protagonist.
During his intersecting careers as art restorer and Israeli spy, Gabriel Allon has tangled with Russian gangsters and al-Qaida terrorists. He has become well-acquainted with operatives in multiple security agencies and befriended a paid assassin. He has busted art thieves and created passable forgeries by Renaissance masters and abstract Modernists. This latest installment centers around his relationship with the pope and a newly discovered painting by Leonardo da Vinci that has gone missing from the Vatican. Silva’s novels tend to fall into two categories: books that reflect the politics of the day and books that don’t. His latest is one of the latter, which could be a treat for readers looking for escape, but it falls flat for a variety of reasons. Luxury has always been part of Gabriel Allon’s universe. It used to be an aspect of tradecraft, though. Allon would be wearing a very expensive suit and driving a very expensive car because he was posing as a client at a Swiss bank. Here, his wife is hosting a catered lunch for 150 of their daughter’s classmates in their apartment overlooking the Grand Canal in Venice. What once felt like a scintillating peek into the world of the obscenely wealthy now just feels…kind of obscene. Similarly, Allon goes chasing after a missing painting as a civilian—he retired from Mossad in Portrait of an Unknown Woman (2022)—the same way another man his age might buy a speedboat or get hair plugs. As the story progresses, the stakes are raised, but it’s hard to forget that Allon is now a middle-aged man pursuing a dangerous hobby, rather than a spymaster leading his intrepid team to prevent a disaster that will disrupt the global order.
A rather flat entry in a generally excellent series.Pub Date: July 15, 2025
ISBN: 9780063384217
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: July 17, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2025
Intrigue, murder, and vengeance make for a darkly enjoyable read.
A woman’s life takes a stunning turn and a wall comes tumbling down in this tense Cold War spy drama.
In Berlin in 1989, the wall is about to crumble, and Anne Simpson’s husband, Stefan Koehler, goes missing. She is a translator working with refugees from the communist bloc, and he is a piano tuner who travels around Europe with orchestras. Or so he claims. German intelligence service the BND and America’s CIA bring her in for questioning, wrongly thinking she’s protecting him. Soon she begins to learn more about Stefan, whom she had met in the Netherlands a few years ago. She realizes he’s a “gregarious musician with easy charm who collected friends like a beachcomber collects shells, keeping a few, discarding most.” Police find his wallet in a canal and his prized zither in nearby bushes but not his body. Has he been murdered? What’s going on? And why does the BND care? If Stefan is alive, he’s in deep trouble, because he’s believed to be working for the Stasi. She’s told “the dead have a way of showing up. It is only the living who hide.” And she’s quite believable when she wonders, “Can you grieve for someone who betrayed you?” Smart and observant, she notes that the reaction by one of her interrogators is “as false as his toupee. Obvious, uncalled for, and easily put on.” Lurking behind the scenes is the Matchmaker, who specializes in finding women—“American. Divorced. Unhappy,” and possibly having access to Western secrets—who will fall for one of his Romeos. Anne is the perfect fit. “The matchmaker turned love into tradecraft,” a CIA agent tells her. But espionage is an amoral business where duty trumps decency, and “deploring the morality of spies is like deploring violence in boxers.” It’s a sentiment John le Carré would have endorsed, but Anne may have the final word.
Intrigue, murder, and vengeance make for a darkly enjoyable read.Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-64313-865-7
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Pegasus Crime
Review Posted Online: Jan. 11, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2022
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
