Red War

Starred review from August 13, 2018
A highly original plot lifts bestseller Mills’s outstanding fourth entry in the late Vince Flynn’s Mitch Rapp series (after 2017’s Enemy of the State). The president of Russia, Maxim Krupin, a vigorous, unrelenting dictator given to riding horses while shirtless and hunting wild bears, gets some bad news: there’s a tumor in his brain that requires debilitating treatment and may kill him. To cover up his medical issues, Krupin calls in Gen. Andrei Sokolov, the head of the Russian armed forces and a trusted adviser, to execute a series of military actions that will allow Krupin to disappear without drawing suspicion from either the public or the many internal enemies who threaten his regime. Sokolov, even more of a psychopath than Krupin, plans to invade Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia in a surprise attack on NATO. Meanwhile, CIA director Irene Kennedy sends counterterrorism agent Rapp into Ukraine to figure out what’s going on with Russia and Krupin. Events continue to escalate, and soon the situation is poised to go nuclear. Mills is writing at the top of his game in this nail-biter. Agent: Simon Lipskar, Writers House.