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Summary
Summary
An announcement is made at a meeting of the British Intelligence Joint Counter-Terrorist group: "The opposition may be about to deploy an invisible." An "invisible" is CIA-speak for the ultimate intelligence nightmare: a terrorist who is an ethnic native of the target country and who can therefore cross its borders unchecked, move around the country unquestioned, and go unnoticed while setting up the foundation for monstrous harm. Intelligence officer Liz Carlyle has had to prove herself in countless ways as she's come up through the ranks of the traditionally all-male world of Britain's Security Service, MI5. But this announcement marks the start of an operation that will test all her hard-won knowledge and experience--and her intelligence and courage--as nothing has before. Having analyzed information from her agents, she realizes that there is indeed an imminent terrorist threat. She may even have the invisible's point of entry. But what she cannot draw out of all the "chatter" is the invisible's identity and intended target. With each passing hour, the danger increases. As the desperate hunt continues, it becomes clear that Liz's intuitive skills, her ability to get deep inside her enemy's head, are her best hope for tracking down the terrorist. But will that be enough? And can she succeed in time to avert a disaster? Drawing from her experience as the first woman director general of MI5, Stella Rimington gives us a story that is smart, tautly drawn, and suspenseful from first to last. At Risk is a stunning debut novel that plunges us headlong into today's shadowy and fever-pitched battle between terrorism and Intelligence.
Reviews (3)
Publisher's Weekly Review
The first woman director general of Britain's MI5, Rimington speaks smartly about workplace issues while ratcheting the tension high in her authoritative debut thriller. Enter Liz Carlyle, an agent-runner with a taste for vintage clothes; her married lover, Mark Callendar, whom she doesn't love; and an appealing head of section, Charles Wetherby. You don't need Liz's deductive powers to figure out that Wetherby will eventually succeed Mark, who terminally annoys Liz by leaving his wife. Liz is married to her job. Small wonder: it doesn't get more exciting than this. The Islamic Terror Syndicate (ITS) may be about to deploy an "invisible"-"an ethnic native of the target country"-and only Liz can pull together all the threads. Rimington infuses the chase with moral complexity by making the invisible a real human being, no matter that she boasts a fake name and has "become a cipher, a selfless instrument of vengeance, a Child of Heaven." Most of the characters feel authentic, although Rimington occasionally goes on about strangers briefly glimpsed and introduces several wryly flirtatious male agents too many. She is open about having had an assist with the structure of the book, but the voice rings true, and she keeps faith with a genre she clearly venerates. 150,000 first printing; five-city author tour. (Jan.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Kirkus Review
Does the post-9/11 world have room for espionage fiction? First-novelist Rimington, the former Director General of Britain's MI5, certainly thinks so. An Afghani terrorist who's taken considerable pains to slip into England illegally but under his own name is en route to a rendezvous with a discontented young Englishwoman, a fearsome "invisible" agent, when something goes wrong. The Norfolk fisherman bringing in Faraj Mansoor together with a boatload of other illegal immigrants sets his eye on Faraj's backpack, and Faraj has to kill him to keep from losing it. Rimington reserves the slow-moving first quarter of her story for the events leading up to this murder. Luckily, her fictional counterpart, Liz Carlyle, who runs counterterrorism agents for MI5, is quick to link the telltale bullet, a 7.62 mm armor-piercing round, to an early warning she's already received about Faraj's identification papers, and the hunt is finally on for Faraj and his home-grown terrorist contact, who's working under the name Lucy Wharmby. "I'm not quite working with the police," Liz tells a reluctant witness. "I'm working alongside them." Every branch of Her Majesty's government agrees that Faraj and Lucy have to be captured before they act. But the stalwarts of MI5, their flirtatious counterparts in MI6, the elite Special Forces, and the time-servers in the local constabulary have very different ideas of what the two terrorists might be up to, where their target might be, and what to do about it. Their day-of-the-jackal search for Faraj and Lucy, played out against the violent and resourceful countermeasures of their targets, doesn't exactly break new ground in the genre. Yet once she sets up her irresistible situation, Rimington controls the game of hunters and hunted like--well, like a master of real-life spycraft. New wine, expertly crafted, in old bottles. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Library Journal Review
Rimington, former director general of Britain's security service MI5, introduces us to Liz Carlyle, a young, hip, and incredibly intuitive counterterrorism intelligence officer. Working out of London, Liz receives troubling information that leads her to the coast to investigate a fisherman's homicide. Initially, the case seems connected to a local smuggling ring, but the military assault-style murder weapon arouses Liz's suspicions. Her fear grows as information trickles in: nearby are two members of the Islamic Terror Syndicate (a Pakistani fighter and an unidentified British female), leaving dead bodies, abandoned vehicles, and homemade bomb fixings in their wake. But where are they now, and what is their ultimate target? Despite a few dropped story lines, the author pulls off an exciting thriller with nods to Ken Follett's style and Evelyn Anthony's heroines. Women authors and protagonists are rare in the British intelligence genre, and this debut has series potential. Recommended for popular fiction collections. [See Prepub Alert, LJ 9/1/04.]-Teresa L. Jacobsen, Santa Monica P.L., CA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.