What started out as a one off, one book only affair, featuring Gabriel Allon a grieving man and art restorer, turned avenging assassin, master international spy and later the head of the Israeli Mossad; as turned into one of the most reliably entertaining franchises is all of thriller fiction, spanning 18 books. One of the reasons for the sets ongoing success is the slavish, almost to the point of obsession, eye for detail that author Daniel Silva brings to the stories; he truly seats the details.
Silva's latest Allon outing, The Other Women, offers up a truly inspired "what if" scenario; what if infamous British spy, Kim Philby, who betrayed his country for Russia, had an illegitimate offspring that grew up in the hands of Russian spymasters and was groomed to follow in their father's nefarious footsteps? Silva does a masterful job of immersing the reader in the full Philby story without capsizing the pace of the story he is telling.
Silva knows the right levers to throw, to keep the story headsratchingly plausible to the point where you may starting to think this might be fact rather than fiction. The detail of the geography of the jet setting international locales is spot on as long time Silva readers would come to expect.
The comfortable cast of usual suspects is on hand to aide and abet Allon as he unravels the story by pulling on ever-present threads. As with the best of Silva's outings, betrayal is always on the menu and served up right until the final pages and by some unexpected cooks. Another great read that will leave you just the right mix of satisfied and yearning for more.
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