The Secret Servant (Gabriel Allon Book 7)

The Secret Servant Daniel Silva This is Silva’s seventh entry in the Gabriel Allon series. This is the second time reading it for me. I first read it when it was published. Early this year I began re-reading the Allon series from the first entry. So every other book I have read this year has been an ‘Allon’. All that being said, I am even more impressed with Mr. Silva’s dedication to his mission to reveal or remind the readers, old and new, that no one is safe and no one can be complacent and what has happened before can happen again if we are careful to not ignore the past and its remnants extant today. But, this is no text book. It is no diatribe. This is a first rate author doing extraordinary research on all facets of his characters’ lives, professions, assets, weaknesses, skills and habits. His fiction is a wrapper for the historical facts but his story telling, plot weaving and character consistency is compelling, exciting and entertaining. Kale may be a necessary vegetable but frozen and dipped in dark chocolate makes eating it a lot more interesting. Mr. Silva does not shy away from the reality of terrorism or counterterrorism. He will fight fire with fire. So, his books are not for the squeamish. And finally, if there is someone out there as yet not familiar with Mr. Silva’s work, I recommend that you first read the Acknowledgments in any of his books. This is always a fascinating section of his books. It is not a glad hand piece of puff. One can read how he learned about his subject matter and who he relied upon for research and tutelage and who helped him. This list is full of equally talented and dedicated people in their fields and, for me, says a lot about who Mr. Silva is and how he regarded in his field. My recommendation is that this book is a superb use of your time.

Audio - Review of Secret Servant Plot - Quick, flowing, until the very end, the bit about the wedding could have been left out or confined to a quick five or ten minute, at the most a short chapter. It was nice to know they finally did get married but the details, I found to be unnecessary. The story was not only timely but also very realistic; the course of events could have easily been written in any newspaper. But we the reader or listener, get to hear or read all those little details that couldn't be released to the public. There's something tantalizing about knowing the details that the author stated that were not released in any official document. Pretend that only you and the characters are privy (along with the thousands of other people who read the book) to the book's `For Your Eyes Only' information. Characters - I will definitely read or listen to more books in the series. I loved the characters. I found the fact that the main character not only serves in an intelligence role but is able to maintain a separate and normal existence as an art restorer as a relief to all those other one dimensional James Bond types. Gabriel Allon, the main character is perfect for the simple reason he isn't. He has to do what he has to do. He is not without feelings but he knows when and where those feeling are appropriate. He's not some young stud that runs around bedding women without a second thought; he has an ex-wife with major problems, though I wasn't sure of details. But still it's wasn't dismal, sad but it didn't drown in self-pity. I plan to go back and read the rest of the books in the series after I read Moscow Rules. He's a man who's lost a child, a grown son, so you know he's not some young whippersnapper. He's intelligent, well organized, a man that you want to know, at least as an art restorer. The majority of the rest of the characters were well rounded, enjoyable and at times, scary. I wanted to know more about the characters and not just the good guys. It would be nice to learn what happened to them after the book ended which to me indicated an emotional investment that I developed for the characters. The use of characters were perfect, some had small but crucial roles. Settings - Wonderfully described, detailed without being boring or slowing the story down. Narrator - Excellent, I enjoyed the narrator's work a great deal, while the voices of the females character were not perfect, they within a tolerant range. It's not easy for a man to do a female voice without it sounding awful or laughable. Don't get me wrong it's no better for a female doing a male voice. It is truly an art when a narrator can nail the voice of a character of the opposite sex. Bottom line, a fantastic book with great characters and a terrific story.

I’m on book 7 of a 25 book journey and so far the stories have been impressive. Silva combines non-fiction with fiction to educate readers. The main and supporting characters are so well written. Fair warning do not get too attached to any of them because you will be heartbroken. This story provides a little insight into suicide boomers and the screwed up beliefs that leads someone to take their own life. You feel for the terrorist father. What a heartbreaking storyline that was. On to book 8.

Daniel Silva has yet again written a novel that at the same time will entertain and scare the hell out of you; a novel as well researched and believable as LeCarre in his Cold War glory days, but moving at the pace of Follett or Forsythe at the top of their story-telling skills. In "The Secret Servant", Gabriel Allon, the avenging angel of Israel's formidable secret service, is back to do battle again with the ever-rising tide of radical Islam terrorism. Sent to Amsterdam on a seemingly routine mission to clean up after an assassinated undercover agent, Allon unwittingly uncovers an Al Qaeda-like plot which leads him to London and Elizabeth Halton, the daughter of the US Ambassador to The United Kingdom. Unable - barely - to thwart Elizabeth's kidnapping, Allon sets out with his familiar cast of "citizens of the night" from Tel Aviv's intelligence service, taking him on what I thought his most challenging and harrowing assignment since the days of his youth when he was summoned to wreck vengeance on the Black September perpetrators of the 1972 Munich Olympics massacre. While the main course in "Secret Service" is harrowing suspense and action, told with brutal force and free-flowing blood, the venue here is the very real and very dangerous Islamification of Europe. And while Silva's popularity certainly suffers from blunt talk that may offend the more sensitive or liberal-minded readers, this is a straightforward and intelligent dissection of the threats facing the west today. But it is hardly simple, one-sided, Zionist rhetoric, for while there is no doubt on which side of the conflict Silva falls, he paints a surprisingly balanced picture of the enormity of the issue, wrapping his fiction around radical Islam's rise from the brutal poverty in ghettos in Middle east, fomenting hate fueled by the blunders of the west, and especially of the secular governments in Egypt and Saudi Arabia. In short, gripping fiction with all the right adrenalin charged superlatives. But while the ending may be predictable, and the story is one that you'll recall with each new tale of terrorism in the headlines, "The Secret Servant" falls short on redemption, knowing that while individual acts of terror may be thwarted, the larger war rages on just below the that level of collective conscience we'd prefer not to acknowledge.

Daniel Silva is one of the best writers of thrillers today, and The Secret Servant is another crowd-pleaser in his ever popular Gabriel Allon series. Allon would love to work fulltime as one of the best art restorers in Europe. Unfortunately, he is also a trained assassin for The Office, Israeli's secret service. Professor Solomon Rosner lives in Amsterdam and is a voice against jihadist Islam. He is also an "asset" to The Office, reporting on terrorist activities. When Rosner is murdered in his home city, Allon is sent to Amsterdam to purge his files of anything that may tie the former professor to Israel. But Allon finds much more than he expected, including an explosive plot orchestrated by The Sphinx to murder thousands in London, as well as to kidnap the daughter of the American ambassador. He is thrust into service with the American, the English and the Dutch intelligence communities, trying to prevent widespread death and destruction. But of course, this comes at great personal risk. Silva has a way of working his novels around the current events of the day. He speaks of the dying of Europe, "The Europeans thought they could take in millions of immigrants from the poorest regions of the Muslim world and turn them into good little social democrats in a single generation." According to Allon, "'Islamic extremism is just the latest virus to thrive in Europe's nurturing environment.'" The political situation in Egypt also figures prominently into The Secret Servant, as hard-line Muslims try to seize control of the country. But while much of The Secret Servant deals with very serious themes, there are some comical situations between the different intelligence branches, as well as a big surprise at the end. Also, the regular Silva characters are back including Adrian Carter (CIA), Ari Shamron, Uzi Navot, Chiara, Eli Lavon and even Sarah Bancroft makes an appearance (from The Messenger). There are many authors who produce a series book once a year or so--whether they have something to say, or not. But when Daniel Silva publishes a book, you can expect a story with quality.

Let me start by saying that Daniel Silva writes the best thrillers on the market today, edging out Linda Davies Into the Fire Wilderness of Mirrors (before she turned to chick lit) and the old Ludlums. This isn't one of Silva's best. Yes, it's good. So buy it; read it. Other reviewers here enthusiastically list the novel's good points. The problem - if it can be so called - is that Silva's best is extraordinary. OK, so nobody does extraordinary every single time. But in this novel he is glib and careless, two words I never thought I'd about Daniel Silva. The story is told almost exclusively from the point of view of Gabriel Allon. Yes, Gabriel is a fascinating character, but one of the strengths of Silva's earlier novels - both the other Allon novels and the two IRA/CIA books - is that we see into the minds and emotions of Gabriel's enemies and allies as well. None of that here. We never get a glimpse into the mind of Graham Seymour, the M15 man who has appeared in several novels and whose father we met in The Unlikely Spy. We hear Ibrahim - the sympathetic Muslim character - tell (briefly) of his life in Egypt, but there's a huge difference between telling and showing. Of the mind of Ibrahim's son we know nothing. The Paris-based Sphinx is a veritable walk-on, making an already fragmented plot even choppier. In earlier novels, Silva took the time to develop collateral characters, goodies and baddies, giving both historical background and several pages of episodes from their lives. This novel and the last novel, The Messenger, both lack those backgrounds and the books are weaker because of that lack. The biggest problem created by this absence concerns Elizabeth Halton, the kidnapped woman. (No, I'm not spoiling; it's on the dust jacket.) We have five whole pages to get to know her, and most of that ink is spilled on her father. It's hard to care very much about a person we know so slightly. Yes, we do get bits and pieces of what she's thinking while she's held captive, but that is so generic as to be without emotional impact. We don't know Elizabeth well enough to care, to think she's worth the extraordinary measures expended on her behalf. So the central problem here is: Why would Gabriel risk his life and the lives of his agents for one American woman of good deeds but no distinction? Yes, she's the daughter of a billionaire ambassador and goddaughter of the US president, but those are labels. Why should we care? why should Gabriel? Historically -- within the series -- his disdain for Americans is only very slightly less toxic than for the Brits, of whom he thinks: "They were Arabists by education, anti-Semites by breeding, and still resented the Jews for driving the Empire out of Palestine" (50). Silva addresses that question of motive with (very brief) allusions to the death of Gabriel's own son, but this is too glib, at least as it is presented. We see no inner struggle over the issue from Gabriel, none of the interiority we have been taught to expect by the early novels. And the commercial transaction in Chapter 62 is extremely distasteful, even if read ironically. And then there are the careless errors, of which I'll mention two. In London, Gabriel remarks on page 49 that it's getting dark in December London at 3:30pm, but Silva evidently forgets about latitude two weeks later when "first light" appears at 6:30am, pg 330. On the same day, Elizabeth is driven past Camden Town to Westminster down the Tottenham Court Road, which is one-way south to north. Why be so specific only to be wrong? These errors are minor, minor things (although Silva corrects equally minor things in his Author's Note.) But they are also straws in an ill wind. The Prince of Fire Prince of Fire is an epic adventure carefully crafted, a visceral thriller that engages the intellect. The following book, The Messenger, is the least-engaging of Silva's novels until this one, The Secret Servant. That's a bad trend. Judging the book by Silva's own standards, I have to find it missing the mark. If Amazon gave half-stars, this would get 3.5, but I'll check 4 in honor of the earlier books. Let's hope Silva takes a sabbatical and returns to his earlier brilliance. (For a series that's still getting better with each book, see Lee Child's Reacher novels. The Hard Way (Jack Reacher Novels) Bad Luck and Trouble There's not much for the life of the mind, but the tension is extreme and you'll care about the people.)

I started my last review of a Silva book by noting that whatever else one says about him, he does not sugar coat his message. After finishing his seventh novel involving the Israeli art restorer, assassin and intelligence officer, Gabriel Allon, I can reliably report that nothing has changed. In the story that unfolds is the very a very grim depiction of what is becoming the "Islamification" of Europe. In the opening chapter an Israeli asset by the name of Solomon Rosner, a professor of scociology at the University of Amsterdam has caused a bit of a stir by writing a book entitled, "The Islamic Conquest of the West." In the book Rosner argues that Holland is currently under a sustained and systematic attack by jihadist Islam, the goal of which is to turn it into a majority Muslim state. The Dutch press looked upon the warning as "hysterical claptrap" and pronounced that what the situation needed was tolerance and dialogue. The book and the Dutch response to it made Rosner the most vilified and most celebrated man in Holland. An imam instructed his following that "Rosner the Jew must be dealt with harshly." He was. Murdered on the street. That murder sets in motion a series of events which involves Allon in trying to thwart the terrorists plans. The story is fast paced, intriguing, inormative and scary. Typical Silva, which means a fine read is in store for those that venture into the world according to this author, which unfortunately is a world we are all slowly coming to recognize.

The Gabrial Allon series keeps getting better and better. I have read them all, and this is the best yet. Fast action and a great perspective on Europe's growing problems with radical Islam and, as usual, on the Israeli penchant for survival. Also, we are now seeing characters develop as they reappear from novel to novel. Finally, it is interesting and informative to see Silva explore the terrorist mind as well as the Israeli. While Silva is clearly in Allon's camp, he gives some reasonably unbiased views of how the radical mindset develops from the poverty and sometimes brutal treatment the Muslims receive in some parts of the world. This is a great series. While it would help to start with the first, it is not necessary. Silva provides enough background in the narrative that the new reader will not feel lost.

As always Mr Silva has produced another wonderful - page turning 'unputable down' novel. How can anyone not enjoy his brilliant characters - I always feel as if I know them - Don't hesitate to purchase this book, you really will not be disappointed.

Excellent read

Boa trama, prende o leitor

A fast moving thriller

My first book by Daniel Silva. Interesting to read how the Israeli secret services might be used by the west to do heir dirty work. Good plot.