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Christopher Reich has improved upon his already quick-paced style to deliver one of the year's finest tension-filled adventures. Not only a pulse-pounding thriller, but also a clever story of international espionage and intrigue, Rules of Deception rockets forward from one climactic set piece to the next. If you found yourself breathless after reading The Patriots Club, be ready to strap on an oxygen tank for this high-octane thrill ride. Recommended by John E, Powells.com
Synopses & Reviews
Publisher Comments:
Dr. Jonathan Ransom, world-class mountaineer and surgeon for Doctors Without Borders, is climbing in the Swiss Alps with his beautiful wife, Emma, when a blizzard sets in. In their bid to escape the storm, Emma is killed when she falls into a hidden crevasse.
Twenty-four hours later, Jonathan receives an envelope addressed to his wife containing two baggage-claim tickets. Puzzled, he journeys to a remote railway station only to find himself in a life-and-death struggle for his wife's possessions. In the aftermath of the assault, he discovers that his attackers — one dead, the other mortally wounded — were, in fact, Swiss police officers. More frightening still is evidence of an extraordinary act of betrayal that leaves Jonathan stunned.
Suddenly the subject of an international manhunt and the target of a master assassin, Jonathan is forced on the run. His only chance at survival lies in uncovering the devastating truth behind the secret his wife kept from him and in stopping the terrifying conspiracy that threatens to bring the world to the brink of annihilation. Step by step, he is drawn deeper into a world of spies, high-tech weaponry, and global terrorism — a world where no one is whom they appear to be and where the end always justifies the means.
Rules of Deception is a brilliantly conceived, twisting tale of intrigue and deceit written by the master of the espionage thriller for the twenty-first century.
Review:
"The un-put-downable sixth spy novel from bestseller Reich (The Patriots' Club, which won an International Thrillers Award in 2006) shows he's the equal of such masters of suspense as Ken Follett and Frederick Forsyth. The twisting story line revolves around Jonathan Ransom, a 37-year-old surgeon for Doctors Without Borders, whose wife is killed while mountain climbing in the Swiss Alps. As Ransom struggles to come to grips with this tragedy, he receives two mysterious baggage claim tickets addressed in her name. Ransom tracks the luggage to a remote train station, where two Swiss police officers attack him shortly after he picks up the baggage. Once safely away, he examines the contents only to realize that his wife was an undercover agent involved in 'the blackest of black ops' — a plot that includes unmanned airborne vehicles, secret uranium enrichment facilities in Iran and the destruction of Israel. This first-class adrenaline fest will leave readers guessing until the last page. Author tour. (July)" Publishers Weekly (Starred Review) (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)
Review:
"Rules of Deception," Christopher Reich's new international spy thriller, is a most perplexing piece of work. At its best, it's first-rate popular fiction: sharply written, solidly researched, sophisticated, suspenseful, even surprising. For a time, I thought Reich was going to produce something exceptional: perhaps a "Day of the Jackal" for our age of terrorism. But then the novel began to fall apart.... Washington Post Book Review (read the entire Washington Post review) Too many coincidences. Too many chase scenes with no point. Too many miraculous escapes by the hero. The publisher calls the novel "a page-turner to end all page-turners," but this reader finally was turning the pages not with excitement but dismay. There are pleasures to be found here, but in the end "Rules of Deception" is a missed opportunity. Reich offers three plots that eventually merge. In the first, an idealistic young American doctor, Jonathan Ransom, loses his beloved wife in a skiing accident in the Swiss Alps, only to learn that she had been leading a double life as a spy. Ransom, of course, determines to dig out the truth about her. He thus becomes that classic figure (played in movies by Jimmy Stewart in decades past, and perhaps by Matt Damon today), the stubborn amateur, in over his head, who soon has the police trying to arrest him and the villains trying to kill him. As Ransom slowly discovers the truth about his wife's duplicity — and as various murders, double-crosses, deceptions and chases ensue — U.S. and Swiss authorities learn about a high-tech drone that is going to be used to bring down a commercial airliner in Switzerland. These intelligence agencies also learn that Iran has secretly obtained nuclear weapons and an attack on Israel is imminent. For much of the way, these plots unfold skillfully, with vivid characters and rich details. Reich offers real-world insights such as this: "If the CIA wanted to question someone, they sent him to Jordan. If they wanted to torture him, they sent him to Syria. If they wanted him to disappear off the face of the earth, they sent him to Egypt." We see a CIA official supervising Syrian police as they torture a terrorist. First, they pull out his fingernails, then they cut off a finger, and finally they put him in a vat of water that is rapidly reaching a boil. He talks. (If they hadn't been pressed for time, we're told, the torturers would have brought in the terrorist's mother or sisters, confident that threats to them would also produce the truth.) Torture aside, Reich does a good job of showing how passports can be forged, how modern technology has revolutionized the spy game, and how nuclear war between Iran and Israel might play out. He also makes the most of his novel's European setting, with loving portraits of the inns and cafes and forests of France and Switzerland. But problems arise. The reader suspects, long before our clueless hero, that he's trusting people he shouldn't trust. In his frequent clashes with authority, Ransom too often has to climb up hotel balconies or down drainpipes to make his escapes. A rather silly ruse is used to enable an assassin to track Ransom across Europe. Duplicities abound. A dramatic but implausible scene in which two senior CIA officials try to shoot each other is paralleled by another in which two senior Swiss officials try to arrest each other. Elsewhere, it's hard to say which character is the more ludicrous cliche: the filthy-rich neo-Nazi undone by photos of his sexual perversity or the Christ-crazed U.S. general who promotes Israel's destruction of Iran to fulfill biblical prophecy. "The Forces of Gog and Magog were set to do battle on the plains of Armageddon," we learn, and the Rapture also figures in the general's strategy. Finally, if we're told of a character, "Each beat of his heart hammered a nail into his chest," we should not be told six pages later that another character's heart is "pounding loud enough to be heard in Austria." Enough with the hearts! One senior editor tells us in the book's publicity material that he stayed up all night to read the manuscript and called the publisher the next morning with the joyous news. Perhaps they all should have calmed down and considered how to improve Reich's impressive but flawed draft. Reich, for his part, has said that "everything I learned about writing, I got from (John) le Carre." Well, he may admire the English master, but this relentless page-turner is nothing like the brooding masterpieces le Carre produced in his prime. Nor, because of various self-inflicted wounds, does "Rules of Deception" equal "The Day of the Jackal" or the expert spy thrillers that the Englishman who called himself Trevanian (real name Rodney Whitaker) published in the 1970s. Reich's publicists compare him to Robert Ludlum, and they may have a point. I once confessed to a celebrated New York editor that I found Ludlum unreadable. The editor replied that Ludlum wasn't writing for me but for tired businessmen, setting out on transcontinental flights, who loved a really convoluted conspiracy. "Rules of Deception" may out-Ludlum Ludlum where fiendish conspiracies are concerned, but a writer of Reich's talent should have done better. Reviewed by Patrick Anderson, whose e-mail address is mondaythrillers(at symbol)aol.com, Washington Post Book World (Copyright 2006 Washington Post Book World Service/Washington Post Writers Group)
(hide most of this review)
Review:
"Mr. Reich turns out to have a turbo-charged plot in the offing, and he begins explicating it with more originality and verve than might initially have been expected." Janet Maslin, New York Times
Review:
"[A] suspenseful story balanced by cinematic action scenes. Highly recommended — fans of early Ludlum will particularly enjoy it." Library Journal
Review:
"[F]ast-paced...Reich succeeds in maintaining the suspense throughout the complex story line." Rocky Mountain News
Synopsis:
The subject of an international manhunt and the target of a master assassin, Jonathan Ransom is forced on the run where he is drawn deeper into a world where no one is who they appear, in this brilliantly conceived, twisting tale of intrigue and deceit.
Christopher Reich is the New York Times bestselling author of Numbered Account and The Patriots Club, the latter of which won the International Thriller Writers Award for Best Novel in 2006. He lives in Southern California with his wife and children.
quicksand, July 22, 2008 (view all comments by quicksand)
Definitely is full of surprises, all of which are made to seem plausible. Very cinematic. Try to read it fast, without a lot of breaks, otherwise you'll be forgetting who did what to who, when, and will be going backwards to connect the dots...Similar in style to Dan Brown.
Was this comment helpful? | Yes | No (4 of 7 readers found this comment helpful)
Christopher Reich has improved upon his already quick-paced style to deliver one of the year's finest tension-filled adventures. Not only a pulse-pounding thriller, but also a clever story of international espionage and intrigue, Rules of Deception rockets forward from one climactic set piece to the next. If you found yourself breathless after reading The Patriots Club, be ready to strap on an oxygen tank for this high-octane thrill ride.
by John E
"Publishers Weekly Review"
by Publishers Weekly,
"The un-put-downable sixth spy novel from bestseller Reich (The Patriots' Club, which won an International Thrillers Award in 2006) shows he's the equal of such masters of suspense as Ken Follett and Frederick Forsyth. The twisting story line revolves around Jonathan Ransom, a 37-year-old surgeon for Doctors Without Borders, whose wife is killed while mountain climbing in the Swiss Alps. As Ransom struggles to come to grips with this tragedy, he receives two mysterious baggage claim tickets addressed in her name. Ransom tracks the luggage to a remote train station, where two Swiss police officers attack him shortly after he picks up the baggage. Once safely away, he examines the contents only to realize that his wife was an undercover agent involved in 'the blackest of black ops' — a plot that includes unmanned airborne vehicles, secret uranium enrichment facilities in Iran and the destruction of Israel. This first-class adrenaline fest will leave readers guessing until the last page. Author tour. (July)" Publishers Weekly (Starred Review) (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)
"Review"
by Janet Maslin, New York Times,
"Mr. Reich turns out to have a turbo-charged plot in the offing, and he begins explicating it with more originality and verve than might initially have been expected."
"Review"
by Library Journal,
"[A] suspenseful story balanced by cinematic action scenes. Highly recommended — fans of early Ludlum will particularly enjoy it."
"Review"
by Rocky Mountain News,
"[F]ast-paced...Reich succeeds in maintaining the suspense throughout the complex story line."
"Synopsis"
by Ingram,
The subject of an international manhunt and the target of a master assassin, Jonathan Ransom is forced on the run where he is drawn deeper into a world where no one is who they appear, in this brilliantly conceived, twisting tale of intrigue and deceit.
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