"Rasputin's Shadow" by Raymond Khoury~ New Thriller!

 

SUMMARY :

 

 

An ingenious, fast-paced historical thriller from the author of the New York Times bestseller The Last Templar

On a cold, bleak day in 1916, all hell breaks loose in a mining pit in the Ural Mountains. Overcome by a strange paranoia, the miners attack one another, savagely and ferociously. Minutes later, two men—a horrified scientist and Grigory Rasputin, trusted confidant of the tsar—hit a detonator, blowing up the mine to conceal all evidence of the carnage.

In the present day, FBI agent Sean Reilly’s search for Reed Corrigan, the CIA mindcontrol spook who brainwashed Reilly’s son, takes a backseat to a new, disturbing case. A Russian embassy attaché seems to have committed suicide by jumping out of a fourth-floor window in Queens. The apartment’s owners, a retired physics teacher from Russia and his wife, have gone missing, and further investigation reveals that the former may not be who the FBI believe him to be.

Joined by Russian Federal Security Service agent Larisa Tchoumitcheva, Reilly’s investigation of the old man’s identity will uncover a desperate search for a small, mysterious device, with consequences that reach back in time and which, in the wrong hands, could have a devastating impact on the modern world.

Packed with the twists, intrigue, and excitement that Khoury’s many fans have come to expect, Rasputin’s Shadow will keep readers turning pages long into the night.

PARTICULARS OF THE BOOK :

Publisher:  Dutton/Penguin Group
Pages:  404
Genre:  Fiction/Historical & Mystery, Thriller, Suspense
Author:  Raymond Khoury
Author's Website:  http://www.raymondkhoury.com
Facebook:  http://www.facebook.com/LastTemplar



Question/Answer Session with Raymond Khoury:



 

 

1.      The real-life Grigori Rasputin was a ladies’ man, mystic, and advisor to the Romanovs, who some say manipulated his way from a mere peasant to a trusted confidant in a place of power in the Russian imperial family. Is there anyone in real-life present day who reminds you of Rasputin?

 

Hah! Thankfully, no one that uber-powerful (or deviant). And though we really don’t know what goes on behind closed doors in the uppermost corridors of power, it wouldn’t be hard to imagine the possibility of Rasputin-like figures in places like North Korea or Russia. Closer to home, there have certainly been many vastly influential men behind the leaders of our times, people like Karl Rove for President Bush, or Alastair Campbell for Tony Blair, but they’re far from what we’re talking about. That said, history is riddled with curious quirks: Nancy Reagan placed a lot of faith in her astrologer after the Hinckley assassination attempt, and Isabel Peron held séances at the grave of Evita in an effort to absorb some of her strength. Stranger than fiction?

 

2.      What authors have had an impact on your writing style and your decision to become a writer?

 

I was lucky enough to take courses in high school where we studied Hemingway, F Scott Fitzgerald, even Raymond Chandler, but at that time, I never imagined I’d become a writer. I can think of several books that triggered something inside me when I first read them: William Goldman’s “Marathon Man,” John Grisham’s “The Firm,” James Ellroy’s “American Tabloid,” even James Patterson’s (yes) “Along Came a Spider” which I thought was a great book when it first came out. The decision to become a writer was actually a decision to make movies (as a director), and the route I chose to get there was by becoming a screenwriter. The books came as a happy accident along the way…

 

3.      If RASPUTIN’S SHADOW were to be turned into a movie, who would you cast as Sean Reilly and as Leo Sokolov?

 

Hmmm. I’m always asked that, and it’s really tough. I don’t picture anyone while writing the books; it’s weird, I know, but they’re these ‘real’ people that I have in my head, not actors playing them. My top picks, if pressed? How about Bradley Cooper as Reilly? And Alan Arkin as Leo? 

 

4.      How did growing up in Beirut during a time of civil war impact your writing?

 

A huge impact. First of all, visceral. Being around gun battles (not actively, I must add), car bombs, aerial and canon shelling, seeing people gunned down, watching aircraft dropping massive bombs or ground-to-ground missiles streaking across the night from the surrounding mountains… these things never leave you, and it probably comes across the heightened urgency and visceral intensity on my pages. I can’t watch a well-made movie about a war situation, like anything from Oliver Stone who was probably the first to craft a very ‘real’ movie like that with “Salvador”, without it generating a deep reaction inside me. I guess watching the war firsthand, and the troubles across the region as a whole, gave me an understanding of the dynamics of politics, religion, power and greed that I’m sure permeates my stories.

 

5.      Amongst other careers, you worked for a time as an investment banker. Being a very creative person, how did you give yourself a creative outlet, outside of the office?

 

I only lasted 3 years there! It was so not for me. But it was a time when I remember watching tons of movies, reading a lot of books, and I guess the mindless atmosphere there, solely focused on generating fake money on screens, allowed my mind to roam and eventually led to all the ideas I’m putting down on paper now.

 

 

 Thank you for joining us today on A Bookish Libraria, Mr. Khoury.  Very interesting answers.  I'd love to see your book put to movie with Bradley Cooper as Reilly.  I saw Leo as more a bearded Mandy Patinkin character...isn't that strange!?  :]   Just goes to show you...



THE BOOKISH DAME REVIEWS :

What initially grabbed my attention about this book was the reference to Rasputin; can't lie.  Who hasn't been intrigued by that mystical and mysterious monk of the Romanov Court?  Once I got past that and realized the novel would also be kicking back and forth in time involving high drama between an FBI agent and Russian female agent, amongst other colorful figures in crime, I was all eyes forward.  Raymond Khoury didn't disappoint in his book.

A fast-paced espionage novel laced with flashbacks to Russia and Rasputin through a journal found by a scientist whose grandfather was an intimate friend of the monk and also an inventor, sets the story in its place.  The central theme is around the pursuit of said scientist who may be a murderer, and who also may be the one who developed a secret and universally devastating, mind-altering device.  (Can't give you more spoilers here)

Khoury is a master at character development particularly of the evil, criminal type.  Although you love to love Reilly, the FBI hero of the story, it's even more fun to follow the bad guys.  His Russian freelancing murderer is not to be dismissed.  The police, FBI, newly-crafted KGB and underground figures all in pursuit of the freelancer, presses the story on to its conclusion.  His Korean gang gets a standing "O" from me, by the way.

On the other hand, I have to say the pieces revealing the scientist's journal and his relationship with Rasputin were less interesting to me.  I virtually skimmed through them.  That may because I've read so much about Rasputin to begin with and I found very little new and compelling information in them.  The story could actually have been written just as well without so much of the journal entries.  I thought it was a flaw in the novel, and would have bolstered the whole if it had been better played upon.

On the whole; however, this is a good read with a suspenseful storyline.  The plot moves along well, the characters are hot and engaging, and the thriller does pack a punch with the climax.  This isn't the first of the Sean Reilly novels in a series, and I got the sense there will be more from the open-ended closure.

Raymond Khoury is a good writer and one you'll enjoy in this genre twisting the historical with the present espionage scene.

4 stars                           Deborah/The Bookish Dame

 

 

 

 

 

"The Panther" by Nelson DeMille~Awesome!

SUMMARY : 

John Corey returns in the new novel from #1 New York Times bestselling author Nelson DeMille.

Anti-Terrorist Task Force agent John Corey and his wife, FBI agent Kate Mayfield have been posted overseas to Sana'a, Yemen - one of the most dangerous places in the Middle East. While there, they will be working with a small team to track down one of the masterminds behind the USS Cole bombing: a high-ranking Al Qaeda operative known as The Panther. Ruthless and elusive, he's wanted for multiple terrorist acts and murders - and the US government is determined to bring him down, no matter the cost. As latecomers to a treacherous game, John and Kate don't know the rules, the players, or the score. What they do know is that there is more to their assignment than meets the eye-and that the hunters are about to become the hunted.

PARTICULARS OF THE BOOK :
Publisher:  Grand Central/Hachette Publishing
Pages:  640
Genre:  Fiction/Suspense Thriller
Author:  Nelson DeMille
Series
Purchase:  Barnes & Noble



MEET THE INFAMOUS MR. DEMILLE!

Nelson DeMille is the author of 16 previous novels. He lives on Long Island, New York.

Biography

Nelson DeMille has a dozen bestselling novels to his name and over 30 million books in print worldwide, but his beginnings were not so illustrious. Writing police detective novels in the mid-1970s, DeMille created the pseudonym Jack Cannon: "I used the pen name because I knew I wanted to write better novels under my own name someday," DeMille told fans in a 2000 chat.

Between 1966 and 1969, Nelson DeMille served in the U.S. Army in Vietnam. When he came home, he finished his undergraduate studies (in history and political science), then set out to become a novelist. "I wanted to write the great American war novel at the time," DeMille said in an interview with January magazine. "I never really wrote the book, but it got me into the writing process." A friend in the publishing industry suggested he write a series of police detective novels, which he did under a pen name for several years.

Finally DeMille decided to give up his day job as an insurance fraud investigator and commit himself to writing full time -- and under his own name. The result was By the Rivers of Babylon (1978), a thriller about terrorism in the Middle East. It was chosen as a Book of the Month Club main selection and helped launch his career. "It was like being knighted," said DeMille, who now serves as a Book of the Month Club judge. "It was a huge break."

DeMille followed it with a stream of bestsellers, including the post-Vietnam courtroom drama Word of Honor (1985) and the Cold War spy-thriller The Charm School (1988) Critics praised DeMille for his sophisticated plotting, meticulous research and compulsively readable style. For many readers, what made DeMille stand out was his sardonic sense of humor, which would eventually produce the wisecracking ex-NYPD officer John Corey, hero of Plum Island (1997) and The Lion's Game (2000).

In 1990 DeMille published The Gold Coast, a Tom Wolfe-style comic satire that was his attempt to write "a book that would be taken seriously." The attempt succeeded, in terms of the critics' response: "In his way, Mr. DeMille is as keen a social satirist as Edith Wharton," wrote The New York Times book reviewer. But he returned to more familiar thrills-and-chills territory in The General's Daughter, which hit no. 1 on The New York Times' Bestseller list and was made into a movie starring John Travolta. Its hero, army investigator Paul Brenner, returned in Up Country (2002), a book inspired in part by DeMille's journey to his old battlegrounds in Vietnam.

DeMille's position in the literary hierarchy may be ambiguous, but his talent is first-rate; there's no questioning his mastery of his chosen form. As a reviewer for the Denver Post put it, "In the rarefied world of the intelligent thriller, authors just don't get any better than Nelson DeMille."

Good To Know

DeMille composes his books in longhand, using soft-lead pencils on legal pads. He says he does this because he can't type, but adds, "I like the process of pencil and paper as opposed to a machine. I think the writing is better when it's done in handwriting."

In addition to his novels, DeMille has written a play for children based on the classic fairy tale "Rumpelstiltskin."

DeMille says on his web site that he reads mostly dead authors -- "so if I like their books, I don't feel tempted or obligated to write to them." He mentions writing to a living author, Tom Wolfe, when The Bonfire of the Vanities came out; but Wolfe never responded. "I wouldn't expect Hemingway or Steinbeck to write back -- they're dead. But Tom Wolfe owes me a letter," DeMille writes.

THE DAME'S REVIEW :  

I make no bones about the fact that Nelson DeMille is one of my very favorite writers of action, espionage novels...if not my favorite.  I love him not only because his novels are always compelling in the genre, but because he is a genius at so many things in the craft of writing.  "The Panther" is just another showy example of his extraordinary skills. 

DeMille's book is thoroughly engaging with a crusher of a beginning showcasing our favorite couple: DeMille's practically stand up comedy of a wise-cracking character, former full-time NYPD detective gone gov't agent, John Corey, and his foil of a brilliant wife, FBI agent, Kate.  For anyone who's read the John Corey series, you know this is the couple who "whop" many a terrorist and militant plotter against our country.  They are mighty, contemporary fighters, and hilarious at the same time.  A thoroughly fabulous combination that keeps me coming back for more, and keeps me turning pages like a machine gun! 

"The Panther" is a hard core thriller.  From the first pages I was completely captivated.  The rogue terrorist, an Al Quaeda leader who happens to have a secret past, kept me on my toes in anticipation of learning more.  And John and Kate plus Team USA fighters are stellar characters with unbelievably complex resumes and personalities.  I loved the whole crew, terrorists and all. DeMille is a master at characterization and plot.

The action is fantastic in this book, as is the primary trait of a DeMille book.  Once you think you have the story figured out, you're thrown a hand grenade of a new twist.  Fabulous writing and  intense action that's just genius. 

I can do nothing but highly recommend this novel to everyone.  Can't tell you how very much I enjoyed it, and how much I think you will, too.  DeMille writes for an audience who enjoys suspense, espionage, action, comedy, and current events.  Do yourself and your significant other a favor and get this one today!

 

HERE'S A FIRST CHAPTER EXCERPT OF THE AUDIO BOOK!

ENJOY...

 

5 stars               Deborah/TheBookishDame    
 

K-Fire Giveaway& Review:"The Sound of Red Returning" by Sue Duffy~A Spy Series with Faith

By Sue Duffy

1st in The Red Returning Series

Genre:  Fiction-Spiritual/Thriller

Espionage

See Info. Below on Ms Duffy's Giveaway!!!

                                                                      Link to buy the book:  http://ow.ly/8B9HT

Cover Rating:

This is a beautifully rendered cover. There's no doubt about the book's being a novel of intrigue. The deep reds are indicative of fury, energy and the Kremlin, which is featured in the background.  I love the hint of the musical score in the background, as well, which tells us that music will play a big part in the story...as does the title "The Sound..." The exotic-looking woman is serious and her face as it is off-set on the cover, gives space and equal importance to the message of the other imagesl. The script used for the book title is elegant. Sue Duffy's name is nicely highlighted at the top banner of the novel, and the indication that this is the 1st in a series mark at the bottom of the cover is a clever touch.  Beautifully designed cover that relays all it needs to to get a reader interested. I'm ready to read, aren't you?    Rated:  A

Author Profile:

Sue Duffy is an award-winning writer whose work has appeared in Moody Magazine, The Presbyterian Journal, Sunday Digest, and The Christian Reader. She is the author of Mortal Wounds (Barbour, 2001) and Fatal Loyalty (Kregel, 2010). Sue has also contributed to Stories for a Woman’s Heart (Multnomah). She and her husband, Mike, have three grown children.

Don't forget Sue Duffy and her publisher are offering a GIVEAWAY on her site for a Kindle Fire and her book now and until February 11th. 

Summary :

After losing everyone she loves, concert pianist Liesl Bower has nowhere to go but to escape into her music. Searching for the peace she usually finds in her concertos and sonatas, Liesl can’t shake the feeling that she is being haunted by her past . . . and by someone following her. When she spots a familiar and eerie face in the audience of a concert she’s giving for the president in Washington, DC, the scariest day of her life comes back to her with a flash. It has been fifteen years since Liesl watched her beloved Harvard music mentor assaulted on a dark night in Moscow and just as long since the CIA disclosed to her that he’d been spying for Russia. She had seen that man--that eerie face--the night Professor Devoe was attacked. And now he’s back--and coming for her.

On the run and struggling to rely on the protection of CIA agent Ava Mullins and handsome newspaper reporter Cade O’Brien, Liesl learns she is the prey of an underground cell of Russian KGB agents determined to restore their country to its former Soviet might. But what she doesn’t know is that she is in possession of something--a piece of sheet music--that Russian intelligence is now frantic to find. Inside that music is a secret code, the hidden transcriptions of her deceased mentor, that clearly identify a Russian mole operating inside Israel’s Department of Defense, a mole with enough power and access to execute a daring assassination that no one would see coming.

Caught in a deadly conflict between American and Russian undercover agents, this innocent young pianist is just trying to survive her own personal trauma. Through it all, Liesl must learn that no matter how dark her world grows or how fiercely her enemies pursue her, God is still in control--if only she can yield herself to His grace.

Read an excerpt here:  http://www.sueduffybooks.com/#!vstc1=books 

You may find out more on Sue Duffy's Giveaway by visitng http://litfusegroup.com/blogtours/text/13452833

Let's Get To Know The Author Better:

Tell us how much of yourself you write into your characters. More than I care to admit. It’s pretty scary when you fit comfortably inside the head of your villain. But I couldn’t birth any character without imparting my DNA. That means I’m a little bit of everyone. A little Sybil-like. 



When did you first discover that you were a writer? When my ninth-grade English teacher told me I was. So I became an advertising copywriter, newspaper writer, and magazine writer. And then I discovered I liked to make things up—not a respectable trait for a journalist. So I shifted into respectable fiction and conjured my first novel.

 Tell us the range of the kinds of books you enjoy reading. In fiction, I used to read only Frederick Forsyth, Tom Clancy, Robert Ludlum, Patricia Cornwell, John Le Carre, Ken Follett, and other high-suspense authors. Some of my women friends thought that strange. So I tried some of the sweeter, softer novels they liked—and decided to find new friends :-)
Now, though, my reading list is all over the place, from Joyce Carol Oates to Ted Dekker.

How do you choose your characters’ names? I was driving through the mountains alone when the storyline of my first novel sprang to mind. I pulled over as soon as I could to make a few notes and realized I was in a small cemetery. I took my characters’ names from the tombstones in front of me.
Since then, the names have come from more conventional sources: seed catalogs, legal notices, members of Congress, Olympic athletes, obits, phone books, old movies, cartoons. You know.

 What is the accomplishment that you are most proud of? Professionally: the publication of my first book. Personally: the publication of my first book. Mortal Wounds, in 1998. My second novel, Fatal Loyalty, was released last year. And now Kregel is launching my new series with the release of The Sound of Red Returning.


Here's the Dame's Review:

Very rarely will I pick up an inspirational novel having to do with espionage.  What!?  God and spying?  Yet, there is much to be said about that very topic in history altogether, and in our own national history now and in the recent past.  Prayerful men and women have guarded our country and the well-being of our people for centuries, and it's good when someone with the creative mind and writing skills of Sue Duffy takes up her proverbial pen and reminds us of that.  "The Sound of Red Returning" is an excellent suspense novel, and it's not to be missed. 

From the first gripping chapter until the last, you will find yourself flying through this book.  I was surprised how much it caught my interest.  I'm a huge fan of Nelson de Mille's early works in this genre, so a very hard-sell on nearly every  woman author trying to break through on spy novels, and; jaded as I was, I tried "The Sound of Red Returning" with one eye squinted.  How surprised I was to find that I really liked it.

Sue Duffy is an excellent writer.  She has developed a very spine- chilling story and given us a female protagonist to be proud of. I loved her snappy dialog, her character development and the suspense she created.  Great spy novel that gives us wonderful musical references, as well.

For a journalist who likes to "make up stories," I'd say Sue Duffy does very well for herself.  I highly recommend this surprising and suspenseful novel.  Perhaps changing my mind about women who write spy novels...

5 stars

Deborah/TheBookishDame

*I was given a copy of this book for an  honest review on my part.