The Counterfeit Agent

December 23, 2013
Edgar-winner Berenson's action-packed eighth John Wells novel (after 2013's The Night Ranger) finds the ex-CIA man on an Atlantic cruise with his girlfriend, Anne, to whom he proposes. Anne turns him down, saying he must choose between her or his job, and soon enough he's off on a new mission to stop Iran from killing a CIA station chief. A woman calling herself Salome, who's working for an international secret agency that may have no ties to any government, is running the operation, whose actual purpose is to trick the American government into bombing Iran. Wells must go up against the CIA as well as the secret agency in trying to ferret out the truth, but he can't accomplish it all, so the end, while satisfying, almost certainly points to a follow-up volume. Thriller fans will eagerly await the return of the estimable, if romantically challenged, Wells to finish the job. Agent: Heather Schroder, ICM.

February 1, 2014
In this newest John Wells novel from Berenson (The Night Ranger, 2013, etc.), the superagent tries to foil a plot to force the U.S. into a war with Iran. John Wells' girlfriend responded to his marriage proposal with a counteroffer: Stop doing work for the CIA, or it's over. Unfortunately for Wells' love life, Vinny Duto--who recently traded his post as CIA director for a seat in the Senate--chooses that moment to call and ask for a meeting. He's gotten a tip from a former associate that someone--allegedly a CIA case officer--is out to assassinate a station chief. Meanwhile, the agency station in Istanbul has been talking to an anonymous source who claims to be a Revolutionary Guard colonel. The source mentions an attack on a CIA station chief and insists his fellow Iranians are behind the plot. When the attack happens, the agency takes the source's next claim--that the Iranians are planning to smuggle enriched nuclear material into the U.S.--very seriously. But Wells, Duto and Wells' former boss, Ellis Shafer, aren't sure. Unfortunately, Ellis is on the outs at the agency, and as a freshman senator, Duto doesn't have any sway at Langley anymore. If the three of them are going to figure this out, they're going to have to do it without the agency's help. Fans of Berenson's John Wells series will happily find more of the same here. Wells gets himself out of scrape after scrape using his considerable brains and brawn, while Ellis Shafer lets loose his usual array of dry zingers. But as always, Berenson sets this series apart by doing his homework. The locations are meticulously researched and exceptionally well-realized. Berenson also clearly knows his spycraft, and his knowledge of the inner workings at Langley adds an additional layer of detail. The dialogue is occasionally wooden but less so than most novels in the genre. And in a series first, the novel's end leaves plenty of loose threads dangling, allowing copious room for a sequel. Another well-crafted entry in Berenson's excellent John Wells series.

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February 1, 2014
Readers' satisfaction with Berenson's latest John Wells thriller will depend on how comfortable they are with an open-ended, cliff-hanger ending. An eccentric billionaire is hoping to incite a war between the U.S. and Iran, and the new leaders at the CIA seem to be taking the bait. Former CIA director (now senator) Vinnie Duto and agency analyst Ellis Shafer (now on the outs with management) suspect a scam and engage freelance agent Wellsoff the books, of courseto figure out what's going on. The trail leads first to Mexico and then to Hong Kong and Istanbul, where Wells is captured by a renegade former CIA agent who, together with a mysterious woman, is running the operation. As in the previous installments in this suspense-filled series, Berenson ratchets the tension ever higher, combining plenty of vividly detailed bloodletting with a fascinating look at geopolitics and the self-serving quagmire of governmental bureaucracy. Wells stands outside all that, a Rambo with a brain who can't resist the call to action. The clock is ticking loudly this time, though, and fans will have to wait until the next book to see if Wells saves the world one more time.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)

September 15, 2013

A station chief dies shortly after the CIA receives a warning from a disillusioned Iranian Revolutionary Guard commander, so the next warning--about a radioactive package en route from Dubai to the United States--is taken seriously. The eighth in the best-selling John Wells series.

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