Description:

The Russian bear is stirring—and it’s hungry— in the #1 New York Times–bestselling series’ thrilling fifth novel.

The first disturbing reports reached Delta Force Lieutenant Colonel Charley Castillo in the form of backchannel messages concerning covert U.S. intelligence assets working for a variety of agencies suddenly gone missing and then, suddenly, inexplicably, found dying. Or dead. One in Budapest, Hungary. One in Kiev, Ukraine. One in Ashgabat, Turkmenistan, mere klicks from the Iran border. And then one in Virginia, along the Potomac River, practically in the shadow of CIA headquarters.

Castillo finds the information both infuriating and fascinating, particularly after a recent experience with two CIA traitors whose own deaths were swift and suspicious. Despite there being some similarities, though, he thinks there’s something different with these new cases, something he can’t quite put his finger on. At first, it’s idle thought, but Castillo expects it’s only a matter of time before the commander in chief assigns him and his group of troubleshooters in the innocuously named Office of Organizational Analysis to look into the deaths while all those intel agencies fight among themselves trying to put the pieces together.

Meanwhile, Castillo has problems of his own—fallout from recent missions involving a clandestine rescue of a DEA agent from South American drug runners, and the confiscation of some fifty million dollars from thieves in the Iraqi oil-for-food scandal. He’s made more than a few enemies, he knows—both foreign and domestic. And then comes another back-channel message, this one delivered personally by his lethal friend, the Russian mobster arms dealer. All that has happened so far, he says, is just a warm-up for what’s about to come out of the Kremlin.

Could sabers be rattling for a new Cold War? Or worse? Presidential Agent C. G. Castillo is about to find out. . . .

Filled with Griffin’s trademark rich characters and cutting-edge drama, this is another exceptional novel in an exceptional series.

From Publishers Weekly

In bestseller Griffin's gung-ho fifth presidential agent novel (after The Shooters), the U.S. president assigns Lt. Col. Charley Castillo, a member of the Office of Organizational Analysis, a special task—to track down the terrorists who murdered an American diplomat in Buenos Aires, Argentina. When Castillo's inquiries lead him to a pair of defecting Russian spies, they offer information about an Iranian-run bioweapons factory hidden in the Congo. Readers who want exciting accounts of desperate battles have come to the wrong place. Griffin excels in describing the planning and the bureaucratic tussles that have to occur before the first bomb goes off. He understands the psychology and motivations of military and clandestine service officers. While he paints an enticing, if overly idealized, portrait of loyal, capable people drawn to others of their kind, realism isn't his strong suit. Still, Griffin's many fans will be rewarded. (Jan.)
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From Booklist

Griffin, the veteran author of military-themed thrillers, once again proves that the same old thing can sometimes be just what readers want. The latest Presidential Agent novel is written in exactly the same tough-fisted style, with exactly the same sort of shorthand characterizations and hard-edged dialogue, as the novels that came before it. The story, too, is typically involved: a series of assassinations leads Presidential Agent Charlie Castillo to believe that his own name appears on the assassin’s list of victims. But can Charlie and his band of operatives stop the killings in time? Oh, and what about those two high-level Russian intelligence officers who claim they want to defect to the States but only to Charlie personally? Do they really know who’s building weapons of mass destruction, or are they trying to sell Charlie a bill of goods? Griffin’s formula is straightforward: set up a bunch of obstacles, and let us watch Charlie knock ’em down one at a time. His novels promise action, suspense, and rousing entertainment, and they never fail to deliver. --David Pitt