MADNESS OF THE Q, Second Sam Teagarden Political Adventure from Gray Basnight

 [Originally published at New York Journal of Books]

“If you like a book that lands you back in reality feeling relaxed and happy about what could happen to an ordinary guy tossed into deadly events, Madness of the Q is ideal. It might even get you through the holiday season, feeling like you and Sam both have it pretty good after all.”

Breaking out of genre expectations, the new international thriller from Gray Basnight features a second appearance of math professor Sam Teagarden: a happily married American who agrees without argument to step forward when his nation calls him to fly to Europe to examine an epidemic of suicide and the ancient document that may be causing it, and who, when propositioned on a cruise ship by a woman who strips her lovely body in his cabin, prefers to get out on deck and have another imagined conversation with his smart and very supportive wife.

Madness of the Q leaps from one messy political murder to the next, as a killer working for the Vatican chases Sam through Israel and across Europe. Sam’s gentle stumbling pace upgrades to a desperate race, as a second assassination threat, this time from a group called Freedom From God (FFG), targets him as well. Once upon a time a CIA code analyst, and technically called into this case by the FBI, Sam is nonetheless way out of his depth, as even the first threat to his life sets off his posttraumatic stress syndrome (PTSD) at maximum level.

That PTSD is well earned, after what happened to Sam in Basnight’s 2018 thriller, Flight of the Fox. Sam, it turns out, is politically significant to both his nation and his world, because his analytical skills in the preceding adventure impelled him to discover, and then reveal to the world, corruption within the US government. He has become a symbol, a person who can be trusted completely. That’s why the FBI wants him to come reassure the world about the ancient document and its implications.

This newly unearthed document is Q­—that is, part of the source document for the Christian gospels. It includes a fragment that apparently is setting believers to kill themselves, and nonbelievers to try to get Sam to vouch for what’s said there.

Almost accidentally, he’s the sole survivor of a failed US government and Israeli operation that lands him with the car, spy devices, and huge wad of cash. But Sam’s no trained spy himself, despite his brief work in a CIA code team:

“He certainly had enough cash for bribery, although waving money around was not something he had much experience with. Neither was he experienced in secretly traveling around the Mideast with zealots hunting him like lions on the savanna.”

Although he can kill if forced to, Sam’s basically a nice ordinary professor who’d rather be home with his wife and students. As a result, instead of a Patterson or Le Carré global thriller, Madness of the Q feels like an updated and gender-switched version of the Mrs. Pollifax “spy mysteries” written by Dorothy Gilman in the 1960s and 1970s.

As Sam’s wife, in one of his imagined conversations with her, tells him: “Don’t overthink it. And don’t put so much faith in that silly firearm. You’re Sam Teagarden. You don’t outshoot villains. You outsmart them.”

Here’s the book’s somewhat annoying flaw: Sam doesn’t actually outsmart anyone. Even his math insights are basic to an extreme. But he does outlast the villains, by hiding, jumping, and clinging to those who want to assist him, save his life, and get him to the meeting where he can testify about the fragments of the Q. This turns out to be highly effective as a story device: Sam is such a well-meaning and honest person that the book becomes a page-turner, and while his choices repeatedly flop for lack of spy savvy, his alliances prove well chosen in protecting him and getting him to the unexpected and wryly humorous final twists of the adventure.

If you like a book that lands you back in reality feeling relaxed and happy about what could happen to an ordinary guy tossed into deadly events, Madness of the Q is ideal. It might even get you through the holiday season, feeling like you and Sam both have it pretty good after all. 

[Down & Out Books, released Dec. 14 -- a nice gift book, as well as holiday relief!]

PS: Looking for more mystery reviews, from cozy to very dark? Browse the Kingdom Books mysteries review blog here.

Mossad Espionage and Counterterrorism from Jonathan de Shalit

[Originally published in the New York Journal of Books]

“It’s stylish to portray Mossad as the least likeable and most dangerous of all the secret mission forces in the Western world.”

Ejected Mossad agent Ya'ara Stein is tapped by Israel’s prime minister to create a secret, un-acknowledgeable task force that can strike at will, without publicity, and without compunction. If it’s necessary to kill for Israel, this task force should be able to do exactly that.

Stein is brilliant and deadly, a combination that probably should go with some form of psychopathy. Or is that a normal result of training with Mossad and appreciating the horrors that antisemitism and global warfare commit against Israel daily? Because author Jonathan de Shalit (a pen name for a former Israeli intelligence agent) never clears that up, a terrible ambiguity lingers, and even deepens, around this highly connected woman. Her love affairs are riven by treachery than she’s willing and able to conceal. Her friendships shiver with regrets and past violent actions. She is, in fact, the title’s embodiment: A Spy in Exile.

But the truly likeable side of Ya’ara Stein is the tender care, planning, and acuity she invests in training her team of “cadets.” With her partner Aslan, as she lists the credentials their newbies should have, she asserts, “We’ll look for people who are missing a part of their soul.” Aslan, in protest, says, “And yet they must still be trustworthy, stable, cool-headed, and all that.” “Yes.”

Because of a sudden need from “above,” Ya-ara and Aslan opt to train their team in live action, taking down a Russian terrorist plot. There’s little hidden from the reader, who looks over the shoulder of the Russian planners, the terrorists in the field, and the possible bed-partner of Ya’ara’s who is accidentally tangled in the mess. de Shalit’s adroit plotting and description of weapons and their effects makes the action scenes lively and compelling, with highly believable terrorist aims.

Ya’ara hadn’t believed to begin with that the sloppy occupants of the farm could be running the show all on their own.

“’Do you know what these are?’ Ya’ara asked Aslan.

‘Of course. Field dossiers.’

… an operation—information on their residences, their vehicles, the roads in and out of the respective areas, the security measures in place in the vicinities. All at once, the pieces of the puzzle slipped into place. Ya’ara looked at Aslan. The blood had drained from her face. She felt as if she was seeing ghosts. History never remains in the past, and here it was, coming back to haunt again.

Yet Ya’ara is labeling more than her team when she talks about “missing a part of their soul.” Her clarity of mission allows her to take finely honed extreme risks for herself, and to betray as needed, in order to complete the task. It’s not a comfortable situation to observe. de Shalit’s first book, Traitor, won acclaim and in particular was praised for the author having learned from John Le Carré. If that is indeed the case, then the author has learned to portray a female and still employable version of Le Carré’s less than lovable traitors. Oh, Ya’ara won’t betray Israel, that’s clear – but don’t expect her to regret any other option for more than a day or so. She’s not made for high principles other than doing her job.

It’s stylish to portray Mossad as the least likeable and most dangerous of all the secret mission forces in the Western world. A question that lingers long after reading this fast-paced modern espionage novel is, Where’s the moral gap? In the agency–or the author–or just the character in place? Or, more likely, in exile.

-->PS:  Looking for more mystery reviews, from cozy to very dark? Browse the Kingdom Books mysteries review blog here.