Jason Matthews: Palace of Treason

Red Sparrow flies again
Red Sparrow was one of my best reads in 2013. It was an "outstanding, exciting, chilling espionage thriller" and the sequel Palace of Treason meets the same bill, if not more so.

The Red Sparrow, Dominika Egorova of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service, the SVR, is now back in Moscow after a spy exchange went badly wrong and the CIA spy she was swapped for was assassinated. She has survived lengthy and sometimes violent interrogations about her capture by the CIA and has been promoted to Captain after her ordeal.

Dominika loathes the people she serves in the SVR, who are mostly thugs and supporters of Putin's Russia, especially her boss Alexai Zyuganov, a murderously psychotic former KGB operative who still loves his "work" in the cellars of Lubyanka prison. Nobody in Russia knows that she is now also working for the CIA as Washington's top Russian mole. What makes it more interesting and dangerous is that she had an intimate relationship with her CIA handler Nate Nash.

This top-notch espionage thriller has everything - double-agents, betrayal, violence, great street-craft (avoiding surveillance), revenge, blackmail, and murder. The locations range from Moscow to St Petersberg, Athens, Paris and of course Washington. Again it is an outstanding, exciting, chilling, and page-turning espionage thriller. Add some romantic interludes between Dominika and Nate and the pages sizzle.

The author is very brave to bring current affairs to life, especially the inclusion of Vladimir Putin in the plot (the imaginary bedroom scene between Putin and Dominika is especially memorable and totally unguessable).  The book is "authentic" because Jason Matthews had real life experiences of the world of spying as he worked for 30 years with the CIA.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys espionage thrillers. It is already in my short list for my top reads of 2015. While Matthews has written a great back-story about what happened in Red Sparrow, I do strongly recommend that you read that book first.

Unfortunately, readers outside the US region may have to wait until January 2016 for this book to be published in their region.

Jason Matthews: Red Sparrow

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Outstanding, exciting, chilling espionage thriller
This is undoubtedly the best espionage thriller I have read this year, and probably for several years. The Cold War is over but espionage between the US and Russia (under Putin) continues. While the KGB morphed into the SVR in 1991 many of the old operators moved on to the SVR, notably the ambitious and unscrupulous Deputy Director, Vanya Egoravov. On the surface things may seem to have changed but with the elevation of Putin a lot of things stay the same.

Nathaniel (Nate) Nash is a junior at the CIA Moscow Station but with natural streetcraft skills to be able to meet and collect information on the streets of Moscow from MARBLE, the most important mole in the Russian government. After an accidental contact with Russian operators Nate gets moved to Helsinki Station.

Dominika Egoragov is a beautiful ballerina student, who has a unique personal skill as a synesthete where she sees the emotions and intentions of others as colours. After an accident stops her dancing career, she  is recruited into the SVR under pressure by her Uncle Vanya. She undergoes intense training as an SVR agent, including at "Sparrow School" which specialises in the art of espionage seduction. Vanya then sends her to Helsinki to try and recruit Nate and find the identity of MARBLE. As she becomes closer to Nate she is humiliated by her controllers and turns more and more to him for support.

Jason Matthews is a masterful storyteller who takes us inside the treacherous world of espionage on a switchback trail of lies, disinformation, deceit, treachery, violence and torture. The story has real authenticity as during Matthews' 33 year career with the CIA he was involved in many of the spycraft and recruitment activities that are a key element of this amazing tale.

This is a great espionage thriller which will keep you absorbed throughout as the plot twists and turns in unexpected ways.  It is highly recommended for anyone looking for a really intelligent, realistic, exciting and sometimes chilling thriller.