Publisher's Weekly Review
In bestseller Coulter and Ellison's adventure-filled fourth thriller in the Brit in the FBI series (after 2015's The End Game), Nicholas Drummond and his partner-lover, Michaela "Mike" Caine, travel to Venice, Italy, to meet master thief Kitsune, who needs the skills of their Covert Eyes team. Kitsune has gotten on the bad side of evil twins Cassandra and Ajax Koath, former clients of hers who are obsessed with finding the Ark of the Covenant and its promise of power. Having learned to harness weather from their genius grandfather, Jason Koath (who built on an idea of Da Vinci's developed by Nikola Tesla and his own grandfather), the twins have caused a sandstorm from the Gobi Desert to bury Beijing. From the Koath twins' mountain fortress in Italy to Jason's hidden island in the Bermuda Triangle, Kitsune and the Covert Eyes team engage in an epic series of battles with the twins and their minions. Fans of popular culture will appreciate the references to such icons as the Star Trek Romulans, Harry Potter, and Sherlock Holmes. Agent: Robert Gottlieb, Trident Media Group. (Mar.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Kirkus Review
FBI agents hunt for the Ark of the Covenant.Special agents Nicholas Drummond and Michaela "Mike" Caine are the heads of the new Covert Eyes team, which takes only the most difficult cases. They get a call from their frenemy Kitsune, a famous thief also known as the Fox, who begs their help in rescuing her British husband, Grant, who's been kidnapped by a pair of psychopathic twins who'd hired Kitsune to steal Moses' staff from the Topkapi Palace. The staff is a fake, but Cassandra Kohath and her twin, Ajax, part of a family whose lifetime goal has been to find the Ark of the Covenant, will stop at nothing to get it. Now Kitsune's on the run in Venice, and when Drummond and Caine arrive, they become just two more people the Kohaths want dead to hide not only the secret of the Ark, but also their grandfather's ability to create storms all over the world. Case in point: he's just moved a vast amount of sand out of the Gobi, creating a storm in Beijing that could kill thousands. The twins' mother was working in the Gobi when she disappeared, and they're sure the ark is buried there. But now that the sand is gone, they find nothing more than part of a golden wing that once covered the chest holding the ark. The three team up in the hope of rescuing Grant and finding the base from which the elder Kohath is using his unusual powers to wreak havoc all over the world. After all that's been written about the ark in countless adventure stories, it's hard to find any new ground to cover. But there are action and thrills aplenty in Coulter and Ellison's new addition to their Brit in the FBI series (The End Game, 2015, etc.). Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
*Starred Review* The Staff of Moses, the Ark of the Covenant, and the Bermuda Triangle all figure in this action-packed outing. The clients who engage master international thief Kitsune (known as the Fox) to steal the Staff of Moses from Turkey's Topkapi Palace intend to kill her once she completes the job; thwarted, they kidnap her husband. Kitsune calls on past adversaries, FBI Special Agents Nicholas Drummond and Michaela (Mike) Caine, new heads of the handpicked Covert Eye team, as the only persons skilled enough to help her, telling them she overheard talk of a pending Gobi Desert sandstorm that will bury Beijing. When the deadly sandstorm occurs and kills thousands, it's clear that weather disasters are being engineered, all part of a plan by the evil Kohath twins, Cassandra and Ajax, to build wealth and achieve world domination. Action moves from New York to Venice to Rome to an unmapped volcanic Caribbean island, where the twins' grandfather has built on the genius of da Vinci and Tesla, as Drummond and Caine race to prevent disaster to the American homeland. This fourth in the A Brit in the FBI series is hard to put down despite its heft as Coulter and Ellison continue, on a roll.--Leber, Michele Copyright 2017 Booklist
