Spies and Lies

Barry Eisler's last "new" John Rain novel, 2011's The Detachment, combined Rain and his sometime partner Dox with characters from another of Eisler's series, Ben Treven and Daniel Larison. Plot silliness and against-character stumbles made it an underwhelming combination. Since then Eisler has done two Rain prequels and introduced a new series, starring the driven Seattle PD detective and child abuse avenger Livia Lone.

The Killer Collective opens with Rain solicited to perform three assassinations in is usual "indistinguishable from natural causes" style. Since two of the targets are women he declines, only to find his would-be employer unwilling to accept Rain's personal limits in his trade and targeting Rain himself for elimination. This will prove ill-advised.

In the meantime, Livia Lone has been working with federal agents on a horrific child-abuse ring that may begin to uncover some prominent names. But orders come from higher-ups to pull the plug on the investigation and before Lone can reach out to find other means to continue she learns the people she was working with died in a mysterious plane crash and she herself is the victim of an assassination attempt. She contacts Dox, whom she befriended on an earlier personal mission of vengeance, and he brings her together with Rain and some other figures from the earlier books. Obviously one question is whether or not the group can uncover the conspiracy that has ensnared them, but another is whether or not they even have the same goals in mind beyond survival.

Eisler gives Collective a much smarter and more plausible hook than The Detachment, and cleans away the need for a lot of setup by having the major villain make the decidedly stupid move of trying to hire Rain to kill Livia Lone. It allows him to swiftly loop in most of his cast members and sets up a legitimate reason to bring Rain's estranged flame Delilah into the mix as well. The combustible cast offers plenty of the requisite banter, action and head-butting, and Eisler even manages to include storylines of Rain and Delilah's reconciliation and Dox's burgeoning relationship with the haunted Livia. It's almost too much and there are places where the story shows the strain -- the final confrontation with the mastermind has a little bit of a rushed feel to it even though it tops off a well-told Mission: Impossible-style scheme to lure him in.

In any event, Collective is the combined-cast Magnificent Seven-styled romp that Detachment never was, giving Eisler a legitimate plot in which to insert his top-level action scenes and characterizations. It shows there may be life going forward rather than backward in the John Rain series, and offers some hints for intriguing new directions for the Livia Lone books as well.

-----

Matthew Quirk has shown a knack for creating heroes that seem familiar at first but have a little bit of a twist to them as well as unexpected layers and motives. His reformed con man/lawyer Mike Ford moves in the topmost circles of the power elites, while John Hayes is a former assassin looking to come to terms with what he has done and what circumstances all too often force him to do again.

With The Night Agent, Quirk brings forth Peter Sutherland, an FBI surveillance specialist whose impeccable honesty and record stem from a shadowy source. His father was accused of trading secrets to the Russians and took his own life before the case could be proven one way or the other. The inconclusive result and the suspicious nature of the FBI culture have Peter resigned to little or no chance of advancement in his career. Until he's tapped for a special duty assignment at the White House itself. Unfortunately the job is a lot less than advertised: He's to monitor a specific phone line and if it ever rings, call his supervisors and report whatever is said.

The second time the line rings in his year-long tenure, it's a young woman named Rose who passes along cryptic information given to her by her aunt and uncle just before their home was invaded by armed gunmen. Rose barely escaped but learns her aunt and uncle were killed, and Peter finds himself strangely drawn to her case, even though he's not really involved. But as he finds out more about Rose and about her aunt and uncle he begins to sense she is linked to a plot that has something to do with his unusual assignment and the high-level administration officials he reports to. A second attempt on her life convinces Peter his by-the-book history won't serve either of them as they try to stay alive and unravel the secret plots they've stumbled into.

As in his other books, Quirk gives his lead a slightly off-kilter characteristic that not only makes him more interesting but also helps move the story. Peter's need to be the spotless white knight in order to throw off the stigma of his father's name propels him to take risks he might otherwise skip and intervene on Rose's behalf when she is threatened. The identity of the main opponent shows up pretty early, but Quirk hasn't structured Night Agent as a whodunit: Readers know who the bad guy is but Peter and Rose don't, so we'll follow them while they keep looking. Rose is far more than just a damsel in distress, displaying her own level of aplomb and ability that can make readers question if she is really what she seems to be.

Night Agent is a quick-paced and layered thriller, humanizing its characters beyond the ciphers and tropes that populate so much of the genre: You not only want to see how it ends, you actually care about the trip to get there.