A Spy in Exile

November 15, 2018
Former Mossad agent Ya'ara Stein confronts her troubled past after the Israeli prime minister drafts her to head a secret, independent strike force that even Israeli intelligence doesn't know about."You'll be ruthless and violent if necessary," the prime minister tells her, knowing that will be no problem for a woman whose personal code is that "justice must be written in blood." For her unconventional unit, Ya'ara recruits a half-dozen young and unproven cadets. Their first job after setting up shop in Berlin is to track down the vanished girlfriend of an older colleague with whom the 34-year-old Ya'ara is close. The disappearance, they will discover, is linked to a Russian-orchestrated plot to unleash simultaneous terrorist attacks in Germany, England, and Italy--and have people think the attacks were perpetrated by a new wave of the Baader-Meinhof Gang, the Irish Republican Army, and the Red Brigades. Ya'ara and her charges also target a radical Muslim preacher in London and the jihadi murderer of a Jewish man in a Belgian synagogue. But for all its narrative strains, the book is less driven by plot than the intricacies and inadequacies of relationships. In this, it is very much in the mode of John le Carré (whose books are discussed by two characters), though not as enticing or compelling as the master's best work. Equally committed to love and violence, Ya'ara is such a strong character--a filmmaker when she's not involved in espionage--that one hopes she will return in a sequel that dives even deeper into her divided personality.A different kind of spy novel by a one-time Mossad agent writing under a pen name, this follow-up to de Shalit's Traitor is a bit short on suspense but hums with drama and authenticity.

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After Mossad, the intelligence service of Israel, forces out agent Ya'ara Stein, the Israeli prime minister recruits her for a classified position, for which she will report directly to him. In her new role she will train and lead a top-secret team composed of seasoned spies and rookies. Shortly after Ya'ara assembles the team, she's contracted to head two missions against major threats to the Israeli state. The first concerns remnants of the lethal Red Army Faction, which has reemerged and is wreaking havoc throughout Europe. The second involves increased fears of a radical Islam splinter group. For both missions, Ya'ara is told to neutralize threats to the Israeli populace. VERDICT De Shalit (Traitor) is the pseudonym of a former high-ranking member of the Israeli intelligence community. This second novel featuring Ya'ara is a superb international thriller. Readers of Joseph Kanon will love the descriptive setting. Fans of John le Carré and Daniel Silva will appreciate the swift pace and shocking twists and turns.--Russell Michalak, Goldey-Beacom Coll. Lib., Wilmington, DE

December 15, 2018
Ya'ara Stein tells you in no uncertain terms why she lost her post in Israeli intelligence: I murdered someone. He was a piece of filth who deserved to die. As this challenging novel begins, Ya'ara is back on the job, asked by the prime minister to form a supersecret team, ruthless and violent if necessary. Once they're in place, she assigns them a training exercise that's almost a prank: locate the girl who dumped a team member and vanished. They find her, her story as unsettling as Ya'ara's reaction to it. For the team's second enterprise, things go horribly?and pathetically?wrong, and Ya'ara's chilly response cues us that we're watching a full-bore psychopath in action. For many, this gripping premise will overcome the trudging pace and the overabundance of detail, and there are fascinating bits of tradecraft along the way. It's the portrait of a stone killer? a complex, dark and violent soul - and her world, miles away from Fleming's romanticized capers and le Carr�'s meditations on love and betrayal, that linger in the mind.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)