Power Down


Ben Coes - 2010
    But there was one factor that the terrorists didn't take into account when they struck the Capitana platform off the coast of Colombia--slaughtering much of the crew and blowing up the platform--and that was the Capitana crew chief Dewey Andreas. Dewey, former Army Ranger and Delta, survives the attack, rescuing as many of his men as possible. But the battle has just begun.While the intelligence and law enforcement agencies scramble to untangle these events and find the people responsible, the mysterious figure of Alexander Fortuna--an agent embedded into the highest levels of American society and business--sets into play the second stage of these long-planned attacks. The only fly in the ointment is Dewey Andreas--who is using all his long-dormant skills to fight his way off the platform, then out of Colombia and back to the U.S., following the trail of terrorists and operatives sent to stop him.Power Down is a gripping, compelling debut thriller from Ben Coes, a powerful new author, an amazing talent certain to join the ranks of the genre's finest writers.

Executive Privilege


Phillip Margolin - 2008
    president. To Cutler’s shock, she witnesses a rendezvous between the young woman and the president. The next morning the woman’s mutilated body is discovered, and Cutler is suddenly a suspect. How can she prove her innocence against someone who has the power of the presidency at his disposal?Meanwhile, an associate in a law firm in Portland, Oregon, gets assigned the appeal of a serial killer on death row. The convicted felon claims he didn’t kill one of the victims—a young woman who was working for the state governor at the time—the same man who is now president. Could the president be a serial killer?Both story lines collide in this pulse-pounding thriller from genre veteran Margolin.

The Grave Man


David Archer - 2015
     Sam Prichard was a cop, and a good one, until the bullets took out the joint of his right hip. Now he's trying to learn to live without being a cop, and getting to know his neighbors, learning to walk again and even ride a motorcycle. Life is bearable, barely, but then he gets asked to find a missing child, and the lure of getting back into some kind of police work is too much for him to resist. When he teams up with computer whiz Indiana Perkins, he suddenly becomes one of the best investigators he's ever even known. Now, he's found the missing child, but it's thrown him right into the middle of something that may be a drug war--or could be a chance to stop the next 911! There's no way out for Sam, so he's in for the ride of his life, but when the girl he's becoming fond of is suddenly drawn into the line of fire with her own little daughter, Sam is ready to forget all the rules and do whatever is necessary to win the day.

Point of Impact


Stephen Hunter - 1993
    Today, twenty years later, disgruntled hero of an unheroic war, all Bob Lee Swagger wants to be left alone and to leave the killing behind.But with consummate psychological skill, a shadowy military organization seduces Bob into leaving his beloved Arkansas hills for one last mission for his country, unaware until too late that the game is rigged.The assassination plot is executed to perfection—until Bob Lee Swagger, alleged lone gunman, comes out of the operation alive, the target of a nationwide manhunt, his only allies a woman he just met and a discredited FBI agent.Now Bob Lee Swagger is on the run, using his lethal skills once more—but this time to track down the men who set him up and to break a dark conspiracy aimed at the very heart of America.

The Day of the Jackal


Frederick Forsyth - 1971
    A tall, blond Englishman with opaque, gray eyes. A killer at the top of his profession. A man unknown to any secret service in the  world. An assassin with a contract to kill the world's most heavily guarded man.One  man with a rifle who can change the course of history. One man whose mission is so secretive not even his employers know his name. And as the minutes count down to the final act of execution, it seems that there is no power on earth that can stop the Jackal.

The Intercept


Dick Wolf - 2012
    So when a passenger from the same plane disappears into the crowds of Manhattan, it’s up to Fisk and his partner Krina Gersten to find him before the celebrations begin... And time is running out.

Never Back Down


William Casey Moreton - 2011
    He encounters an old friend from college, a man named Brian Ripley, whom he hasn't seen in nearly 20 years. Ripley is with a beautiful young woman and is clearly in a hurry to leave. Coburn could have never been prepared for Ripley's reaction to seeing him, and he is even less prepared for what happens next. The following morning, the young woman with Ripley is found dead in Washington Square Park, the victim of a brutal murder. Coburn goes to the police and tells them of his encounter with Ripley the previous night. What the police tell him shakes him to his core - Brian Ripley has been dead for 15 years. The story moves at breakneck speed as John Coburn searches for the truth behind the woman's murder and whether or not he really saw his friend, or merely a ghost, that night.

The Moroccan Girl


Charles Cumming - 2019
    When he is approached by MI6 and asked to carry out a simple task on behalf of his country while attending a literary festival in Morocco, he jumps at the chance.But all is not as it seems. Carradine soon finds himself on the trail of Lara Bartok, a leading figure in Resurrection, a violent revolutionary movement targeting prominent right-wing political figures around the world. Caught between competing intelligence services who want Bartok dead, Carradine faces a choice: to abandon Bartok to her fate or to risk everything trying to save her.

Nine Lives


Tom Barber - 2012
    A major terrorist cell is planning a series of attacks across London over the next forty-eight hours. The government has surveillance on the group, a man undercover, and prepare to move in, to take out the terrorists before they can strike. But they lose contact with their inside man. And the cell vanishes into thin air, dispersing into the streets, armed and intent on completing their assault on London. The best Counter-Terrorist teams in the country are told to take them down before it's too late.Nine terrorists.Nine lives.The Armed Response Unit is one of these teams. Efficient and ruthless, the task force is ordered to locate the leader of the cell. As they hunt him down, they begin to realise that this is far bigger than any of them could ever have imagined. Bombings, rocket attacks, betrayal and a series of unexpected and shocking twists leave the ARU fighting to stay alive.There's Archer, the youngest member of the team, keen to prove himself and justify his spot on the task force. His best friend, Chalky, who is forced to fight both the terrorists and his own demons. Porter, Deakins and Fox, tough and experienced men who’ve never dealt with anything of this magnitude. And Mac, their sergeant, who must make the quickest of decisions and lead his men against the invisible enemy.As events unfold, other people are drawn into the danger. The Prime Minister, desperately trying to find a solution and protect the capital. A mysterious female Mossad agent, who appears out of nowhere and joins the fight against the cell. Two Special Agents from the DEA, one of whom was a member of the SEAL team that stormed Osama Bin Laden’s compound and who for some reason is struggling with the memory. And the vicious, powerful leader of a Middle Eastern drug cartel, who operates in the shadows and is somehow connected to the terrorists.With crowds all over London celebrating the New Year, and with nine terrorists somewhere amongst them, the Armed Response Unit is faced with the most dangerous night of their lives. As the savage, shocking plans of the enemy are fully revealed, the ARU officers are faced with the ultimate question.How many times can a man cheat Death before Death evens the score?

The Charm School


Nelson DeMille - 1988
    In a place called Mrs. Ivanova's Charm School, young KGB agents are being taught by American POW's how to be model citizens of the USA. The Soviet goal -- to infiltrate the United States undetected. When an unsuspecting American tourist stumbles upon this secret, he sets in motion a CIA investigation that will reveal horrifying police state savagery and superpower treachery.

Jet


Russell Blake - 2012
    But the past doesn't give up on its secrets easily.When her new life on a tranquil island is shattered by a brutal attack, Jet must return to a clandestine existence of savagery and deception to save herself and those she loves. A gritty, unflinching roller-coaster of high-stakes twists and shocking turns, JET features a new breed of protagonist that breaks the mold.Fans of Lizbeth Salander, SALT, and the Bourne trilogy will find themselves carried along at Lamborghini speed to a conclusion as jarring and surprising as the story's heroine is unconventional.

The Travelers


Chris Pavone - 2016
    Do you know where your husband is? Meet Will Rhodes: travel writer, recently married, barely solvent, his idealism rapidly giving way to disillusionment and the worry that he's living the wrong life. Then one night, on assignment for the award-winning Travelers magazine in the wine region of Argentina, a beautiful woman makes him an offer he can't refuse. Soon Will's bad choices and dark secrets take him across Europe, from a chateau in Bordeaux to a midnight raid on a Paris mansion, from a dive bar in Dublin to a mega-yacht in the Mediterranean and an isolated cabin perched on the rugged cliffs of Iceland. As he's drawn further into a tangled web of international intrigue, it becomes clear that nothing about Will Rhodes was ever ordinary, that the network of deception ensnaring him is part of an immense and deadly conspiracy with terrifying global implications and that the people closest to him may pose the greatest threat of all. It's 3:00 am. Your husband has just become a spy.

The Cairo Affair


Olen Steinhauer - 2014
    Minutes after she confesses to her husband, a mid-level diplomat at the American embassy in Hungary, that she had an affair while they were in Cairo, he is shot in the head and killed.Stan Bertolli, a Cairo-based CIA agent, has fielded his share of midnight calls. But his heart skips a beat when he hears the voice of the only woman he ever truly loved, calling to ask why her husband has been assassinated.Omar Halawi has worked in Egyptian intelligence for years, and he knows how to play the game. Foreign agents pass him occasional information, he returns the favor, and everyone's happy. But the murder of a diplomat in Hungary has ripples all the way to Cairo, and Omar must follow the fall-out wherever it leads.American analyst Jibril Aziz knows more about Stumbler, a covert operation rejected by the CIA, than anyone. So when it appears someone else has obtained a copy of the blueprints, Jibril alone knows the danger it represents.As these players converge in Cairo in The Cairo Affair, Olen Steinhauer's masterful manipulations slowly unveil a portrait of a marriage, a jigsaw puzzle of loyalty and betrayal, against a dangerous world of political games where allegiances are never clear and outcomes are never guaranteed.

I Am Pilgrim


Terry Hayes - 2013
    An anonymous young woman murdered in a run-down hotel, all identifying characteristics dissolved by acid. A father publicly beheaded in the blistering heat of a Saudi Arabian public square. A notorious Syrian biotech expert found eyeless in a Damascus junkyard. Smoldering human remains on a remote mountainside in Afghanistan. A flawless plot to commit an appalling crime against humanity. One path links them all, and only one man can make the journey. Pilgrim.'

Deadly Straits


R.E. McDermott - 2011
    Griffin, R.E. McDermott delivers a thriller to rival the masters.When marine engineer and very part-time spook Tom Dugan becomes collateral damage in the War on Terror, he's not about to take it lying down.Falsely implicated in a hijacking, he's offered a chance to clear himself by helping the CIA snare their real prey, Dugan's best friend, London ship owner Alex Kairouz. Reluctantly, Dugan agrees to go undercover in Alex's company, despite doubts about his friend's guilt. Once undercover, Dugan's steadfast refusal to accept Alex's guilt puts him at odds not only with his CIA superiors, but also with a beautiful British agent with whom he's romantically involved.When a tanker is found adrift near Singapore with a dead crew, and another explodes in Panama as Alex lies near death after a suspicious suicide attempt, Dugan is framed for the attacks. Out of options, and convinced the attacks are prelude to an even more devastating assault, Dugan eludes capture to follow his last lead to Russia, only to be shanghaied as an 'advisor' to a Russian Spetsnaz unit on a suicide mission.Deadly Straits is a non-stop thrill ride, from London streets, to the dry docks of Singapore, to the decks of the tankers that slake the world's thirst for oil, with stops along the way in Panama, Langley, Virginia, and Teheran. Richly spiced with detail from the author's 30 years sailing, building, and repairing ships worldwide, it is, in the words of one reviewer, "fast-paced, multilayered and gripping."