Deception

February 20, 2012
Near the outset of Magson’s solid third thriller featuring former MI5 officer Harry Tate (after 2011’s Tracers), Harry, who’s just finished a freelance job involving an Iraqi terrorist, receives a call from MI6 officer Richard Ballatyne. Ballatyne wants Harry and his sidekick, Rik Ferris, also a former MI5 operative, to hunt down the Protectory, a shadowy group specializing in helping military personnel who have gone AWOL to sell military information to foreign spy agencies. Harry is particularly interested because his old boss and archenemy, Henry Paulton, is involved with the bad guys. As usual, Harry is never sure who is a friend, so he must treat everyone involved, other than girlfriend Jean and Rik, as an enemy. While this entry isn’t up to the standard of the first in the series (2010’s Red Station), it moves Harry’s story along and will keep readers coming back for more. Agent: David Headley, DHH Literary Agency.

April 1, 2012
A British spy thriller from Magson (Tracers, 2011, etc.). Harry Tate is a former MI5 (domestic security) officer asked by MI6 (overseas security) to track down Vanessa Tan, an apparent military deserter with access to highly sensitive national secrets. He'd better hurry, because a shadowy group called the Protectory wants her too. They are deserters who specialize in betrayal by selling secrets to foreign powers. If they can locate Lieutenant Tan, they stand to make a great deal of money by turning her over to an agent of the Chinese government. But it's a dangerous game that is going to leave people dead. Tate knows a former colleague who has probably joined the Protectory and knows just how bad he is. The search for Tan goes deep into Germany and back to Britain as Tate closes in--or does he? The story is well constructed and exciting, with plenty of strong dialogue and plot twists to keep the reader guessing, and probably guessing wrong. The book, however, ends without enough resolution. Yes, the main plot is wrapped up, but major questions remain. At the end, Harry and his colleague could continue their quest for answers, but instead they say the hell with it, let's go have a drink. In effect, they will lie low until Magson writes his next book. A solid read, but the ending doesn't satisfy.

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February 1, 2012
Former MI5 agent Harry Tate returns in an adventure that picks up shortly after his last outing, when he and his sometime partner, computer genius Rik Ferris, almost died after a renegade agent tried to shoot them. Now Harry's former boss, Richard Ballatyne, has an undercover mission for Tateto find army officer Vanessa Tan, who's AWOL from her job as aide de camp to a top British army officer. Ballatyne fears Tan may have fallen into the clutches of the Protectory, a group of army deserters who offer fellow deserters a new life after picking their brains for every scrap of military intelligence they know and selling it to interested parties. But like every job Harry undertakes for Ballatyne, this one is fraught with deception and dishonesty, leaving Harry no choice but to outguess, outplan, and outrun the dangerous men of the Protectory. Magson offers up his usual taut, keep-'em-guessing thriller packed with action and unexpected twists, and guaranteed to keep espionage aficionados on the edge of their seats.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)