The Geneva Option

April 8, 2013
British journalist Lebor (Hitler’s Secret Bankers) introduces brilliant and beautiful Yael Azoulay, a behind-the-scenes negotiator for the United Nations, in his gripping debut thriller, the first in a trilogy. In Goma, Congo, Yael tries to persuade the president of the Rwandan Liberation Front, Jean-Pierre Hakizimani, to make peace with the Rwandan government and surrender to a U.N. tribunal. On returning to New York, Yael is dismayed to discover she’s lost her job; she’s even more dismayed by the suspicious death of her trusted friend Olivia de Souza, an assistant to U.N. Secretary-General Fareed Hussein. And just who leaked Yael’s confidential encoded memo to Hussein to a New York Times reporter? As Yael goes rogue to ferret out answers to these puzzles, she peels away layers of intrigue. The action can be overblown at times, but those looking for a strong heroine in the mold of Lisbeth Salander will be satisfied. Agent: Elizabeth Sheinkman, William Morris.

Starred review from May 1, 2013
This thriller's prologue is a small masterpiece in showing how the seemingly banala worker taking a cigarette break on a balconycan be upended into terror. The rest of the book fulfills the prologue's promise, in ways completely credible and, thus, even scarier. Lebor, a British journalist who has covered the UN for the Times (London), brings an investigative reporter's deep knowledge to cracks within the UN's dealings. His heroine, Yael Azoulay, a UN negotiator, has just finished convincing a former Hutu warlord, guilty of many murders of Tutsis in the 1994 Rwandan genocide, to surrender to authorities in exchange for an eventual return to power. What Yael does not realize is that the UN has used her to set up some stability in the region, thus enabling Western powers to get their hands on the mineral coltan, vital for cell phones and computers but devastating to the Congolese children who often die mining it. After Yael leaks a memo to a New York Times reporter, she is suspended, pending investigation. Yael is determined to get to the bottom of what the UN, businesspeople, and politicians are planning in order to control coltan. Yael's experience and the files she's secretly uploaded enable her to investigate the corrupt cabal, leading to scene after scene of heart-clutching suspense in Africa, Switzerland, and New York. This is the first of a projected trilogy starring Yael Azoulay. Must reading.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)