Product Description

Investigating a murder in London, freelance industrial spy Sam Hoffman discovers a secret institution that hides billions of dollars that have been stolen from one of the world's most dangerous leaders. Reprint. K. NYT.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #277254 in Books
• Published on: 1995-08
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback

From Publishers Weekly
A financial investigator attempts to uncover the secrets behind a London investment company supposedly linked to the ruler of Iraq in Ignatius's latest thriller.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
To complete the trilogy formed by Siro (LJ 4/15/91) and Agents of Innocence (Avon, 1988), Ignatius, a journalist whose beat once included the Middle East, now focuses his powerhouse stare on Iraq. Combining the sly wit of a Swiss bank caper with the horrifying account of a megalomaniacal political regime, this novel features a modern Iraqi woman who works in London as a computer specialist for an Arab conglomerate. Her innocent discovery of a questionable computer file at the time when the Iraqi head of state is assassinated leaves her exposed to relentless attack not only from Iraqi agents but from Israeli and American ones as well. A smitten freelance industrial spy tries to help her out-at least until his father, a CIA operative, interferes. Against a backdrop of true events, documentary realism in the torture scenes, and computer strategies, the couple ping-pongs between frisky romance and dire straits. Ignatius writes dialog of sustained virtuosity, and the plotting, if a little labored, is dazzlingly clever. For most popular spy and suspense collections.
Barbara Conaty, Library of Congress
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Kirkus Reviews
This book is the third (after Siro, 1991, and Agents of Influence, 1987) in Ignatius's cycle on America and the Middle East. A read-in-one-sitting thriller with a philosophical streak, it's also a modern-day Robin Hood story in which Maid Marian fights and Robin Hood has his political consciousness raised. Marian is Iraqi Lina Alwan, a ``trusted employee'' at an Iraqi front company in London. Her boss is the corrupt and virtually unassailable Nasir Hammoud. Sam Hoffman, the son of a retired CIA agent, is Robin Hood, and he wants to stay out of dirty politics. Hoffman unwittingly gets Alwan into trouble. Once she is out of Hammoud's good graces, she must destroy him or be destroyed. But Alwan cannot bring herself to accept the warrior's mantle until the body count rises beyond even her fearful tolerance. She goes underground and becomes the key instrument in the undoing of the government that backs Hammoud. Meanwhile, Hoffman has to fend off his father and the Mossad. Ignatius, assistant managing editor for the Washington Post, spent years in the Middle East as a correspondent for the Wall Street Journal. His knowledge of Arab culture enables him to vivify the world of Iraqis living abroad as he captures all its elaborate manners, refinements in psychological torture (the parachuting episode is an especially creative example), and erotic flamboyance. At the same time he uses his knowledge of international finance to counterpoint the chase plot with the suspenseful elements of encrypted passwords, numerous Swiss bank accounts, and a slippery $158 million. Ignatius is both artist and craftsman. Lina Alwan is an unforgettable hero; the send-up of the CIA (especially Hoffman Sr.'s history lesson at the end) is hysterical; and the depiction of the Iraqis offers a glimpse into a dark and mysterious power that affects us more than we know. -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.