An action-packed thriller worthy of the Ludlum legacy.
Gervais, a talented thriller writer, launches a new Ludlum series.
In Cairo, a State Department official barely survives a violent attack, getting the story off to a rip-roaring start. Then in Prague, a car bomb obliterates an Operation Treadstone assassin (no, not Jason Bourne, of whom there is passing mention), and an organization called Blackbriar dispatches operatives Helen Jouvert and Donovan Wade to the Czech Republic to investigate. They are a smart, gutsy duo who are not romantically involved, but stay tuned for future episodes. Blackbriar is a hush-hush outfit contracted by the Department of National Intelligence that, unlike the FBI, doesn't have to worry about rules and stuff. It is a Black Ops counterintelligence program designed to neutralize hostile foreign intelligence operations “by any means necessary” and is so secret that "not even POTUS" knows about it. (Um, really? Is this what America is coming to?) Blackbriar differs from Treadstone in that it is “mostly defensive, going after whoever wants to steal our government’s secrets.” Anyway, Russians persuade four forever-fighting Mexican drug cartels to put aside their differences and join them in undermining the hated United States. In a joint operation called Proyecto Verdad, the Russkies will provide the technological know-how to launch a cyberattack against the United States, and the cartels will kick in a ton of cash. As readers will expect, bloodletting abounds. Donovan Wade puts it this way: “A round to the chest and an eight-inch cut deep into one's throat is a one-way ticket to the big guy.” In his lifetime, Robert Ludlum wrote 27 thrillers. Since Ludlum’s 2001 death, Eric Van Lustbader and others collectively have written about 30 more, all set in the dangerous world of assassins and international intrigue. This is the first contribution by Gervais, and his style fits right in.
An action-packed thriller worthy of the Ludlum legacy.Pub Date: Oct. 18, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-593-41997-7
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2022
Trust no one in this over-the-top tale of deception and revenge.
Dead bodies turn up in the first sentence of the prologue in McFadden’s latest domestic thriller.
The mystery of who died is at the pulsating heart of this propulsive tale. As Chapter 1 begins, Naomi arrives home to find the locks changed on the front door of the gorgeous home she shares with her husband, Jeremy, and their 5-year-old son, Teddy. Jeremy steps out the front door and convinces Naomi to move out while he has their home renovated, a plan Naomi knows nothing about. It’s all a ruse, though, as the next day Jeremy tells her he wants a divorce. Naomi is shellshocked and soon discovers that Jeremy is having an affair with Veronica, a beautiful younger woman. What seems at first like a stereotypical story about a man who leaves his wife turns into something else when Naomi decides she’ll do anything to get Veronica away from Jeremy and Teddy, and Veronica decides to fight for what she thinks she deserves. Fans of stalker novels will cringe with delight as creepy things start to happen. Teddy’s stuffed elephant, a gift from Veronica, is found impaled on a kitchen knife; Naomi suspects Jeremy is gaslighting her and that Veronica tried to poison her. A weird confrontation among Jeremy, Veronica, and Naomi at Teddy’s birthday party, to which Naomi shows up uninvited, is priceless. There are three main characters, and any or all of them may be unreliable narrators. Packing the plot with dark, gasp-inducing twists, McFadden outdoes herself in a story about how highly emotional people engage in risky behavior to get what they want—but in this novel, for better or worse, not everyone will survive.
Trust no one in this over-the-top tale of deception and revenge.Pub Date: May 26, 2026
ISBN: 9781464249631
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2026
BOOK TO SCREEN
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.
A woman accused of shooting her husband six times in the face refuses to speak.
"Alicia Berenson was thirty-three years old when she killed her husband. They had been married for seven years. They were both artists—Alicia was a painter, and Gabriel was a well-known fashion photographer." Michaelides' debut is narrated in the voice of psychotherapist Theo Faber, who applies for a job at the institution where Alicia is incarcerated because he's fascinated with her case and believes he will be able to get her to talk. The narration of the increasingly unrealistic events that follow is interwoven with excerpts from Alicia's diary. Ah, yes, the old interwoven diary trick. When you read Alicia's diary you'll conclude the woman could well have been a novelist instead of a painter because it contains page after page of detailed dialogue, scenes, and conversations quite unlike those in any journal you've ever seen. " 'What's the matter?' 'I can't talk about it on the phone, I need to see you.' 'It's just—I'm not sure I can make it up to Cambridge at the minute.' 'I'll come to you. This afternoon. Okay?' Something in Paul's voice made me agree without thinking about it. He sounded desperate. 'Okay. Are you sure you can't tell me about it now?' 'I'll see you later.' Paul hung up." Wouldn't all this appear in a diary as "Paul wouldn't tell me what was wrong"? An even more improbable entry is the one that pins the tail on the killer. While much of the book is clumsy, contrived, and silly, it is while reading passages of the diary that one may actually find oneself laughing out loud.
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-30169-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
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