BOOK REVIEW: The English Spy by Daniel Silva

BOOK REVIEW: The English Spy by Daniel Silva
HarperCollins Australia – rrp$29.99
1 July, 2015
Reviewed by Shane Pinnegar
9/10

Daniel Silva’s fourteenth novel featuring Israeli secret agent and art restorer Gabriel Allon opens in spectacular form: with the assassination of a Dianna-like English Princess aboard a boat off Saint Barthélemy.

Silva is a master of spy fiction, following on from the likes of Robert Ludlam in creating completely believable intrigue that draws in the (fictional) leaders of the worlds nations, and the foot soldiers who do their dirty work.

Drawing on his extensive experience as a foreign affairs journalist in America and The Middle East, Silva’s stories are elaborate and shocking, and in this world where terrorism is a daily constant, thoroughly chilling in their possibilities.

After the death of the Princess, Allon is forced to leave the side of his heavily pregnant-with-twins wife Chiara, and team up with ex-SAS soldier-turned-assassin Christopher Keller to try and find Eamon Quinn, the man who murdered his son years before.

The search takes them into the still-dangerous world of the IRA, sees them almost killed by a car bomb, and face off against a battalion of Irish terrorists, a Russian spy in MI5, an Iranian double agent, the Russian premier and many more.

Near-impossible to put down, Silva keeps the pacing fast, the action constant, and the plot filled with twists and turns.

Category: Book Reviews