The last Christopher Reich book that I read was Matterhorn, with Mac Dekker as the protagonist. This is the second one and just as gripping. Mac and Ava Attal’s life post their reunion in Matterhorn, has been a bit relaxed or so thinks Mac. They live in Zinal Switzerland and adopt Mac’s grand daughter as his son is killed in action. He finally decides to propose to Ava in Paris, the city she loves.
Well, he being special agent Mac Dekker and she being one of the top Mossad operatives, nothing is as simple as it seems to be, not even lunch at the Jules Verne on the 2nd floor of the Eiffel Tower. One minute Mac and Ava are having lunch and Mac is about to ask the question… and Ava gets a phone call. Several minutes later, when she doesn’t return, Mac tries to find her but realises she has vanished !!!
Mac frantically searches for Ava and despite being an ace agent for the CIA, he is not able to figure out what happened at the restaurant. He feels that Ava is probably on a mission … even though she never mentioned anything. Mac living under a pseudonym becomes the celebrated Mac Dekker once again.
He returns to their hotel room, hoping to find some clues, and in the room he is attacked by two middle eastern men. The attack ends badly for those two men and Mac survives. He connects with his daughter who also works for the CIA and manages to find a safe house temporarily. Soon, it’s obvious that Mac Dekker has stepped into some major geopolitical issue as his own agency wants issues a red notice for him.
With the help of his former colleague and friend Harry Crooks, Mac starts to unravel the whole plot. He manages to find Ava and together they manage to retrieve a hand held nuclear device “Samson”. In the process, Mac realises that he knew very little about Ava’s professional life. The readers also get a glimpse into the way Mossad works. The geopolitical lessons are great as background information as well. We learn about Qatar and the other countries in the Middle East, as well as Palestine and Israel.
The following excerpts from the book are about what happened on October 7, 2023 and about Palestine –
“.. It was Hamas that, on October 7, 2023, sent its soldiers rampaging across the Israeli border to kill and capture as many Jews as possible. The action was viewed as a reprisal by those who ordered it and an act of war by those who had been attacked.”
“…. The interesting thing about Gaza was that it belonged to no one. Not to Egypt, which bordered it to the south. Not to Israel, which surrounded it to the east and north. It was not even its own sovereign state. It was just a strip of land twenty five miles long and four or five miles wide. One hundred forty square miles in total area and home to two million Palestinians no one wanted.”
Anyway, we also get to see how social media “creates” a persona that’s very different from the real person. This is brought out through the characterisation of Qatar’s prince Tariq bin Nayan bin Tariq al-Sabah “TNT” as the guy who lives life on Instagram. He is actually quite devious and doesn’t want peace in the Middle East, but the public thinks of him as a good natured “socialite” who keeps posting pictures of his shoes, fleet of cars and his flamboyant lifestyle.
There is a twist in the tale at the end of the book … won’t spoil the fun for anyone who hasn’t read the book. No, Mac Dekker doesn’t get to propose just yet and that’s not the twist.
Do read. It’s fast paced and a well written spy thriller. 🙂