Having foiled an al-Qaeda plot targeting Times Square in 2006's The Faithful Spy (which won an Edgar Award for best first novel), maverick CIA agent John Wells confronts a very different threat in this pulse-pounding sequel from New York Times reporter Berenson. When the CIA's efforts to extract Dr. Sung Kwan, a North Korean scientist and an invaluable source on Kim Jong Il's nuclear ambitions, result in the deaths of Kwan and the rescue team, Wells's significant other, Jennifer Exley, searches to identify the person in U.S. intelligence who compromised Kwan's security. Meanwhile, Wells returns to Afghanistan, the scene of much of the action in The Faithful Spy, to find out what outside country has been helping the Taliban reassert itself. While the mole hunt will be familiar to genre buffs and the characters and the perils they face aren't as nuanced as those in John le Carré or even David Ignatius, the author's plausible scenario distinguishes this from most spy thrillers. Author tour. (Feb.) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. From: Reed Elsevier Inc. Copyright Reed Business Information

Having enjoyed an illustrious debut with the 2007 Edgar Award winning The Faithful Spy, Berenson deploys CIA agent John Wells to defuse a cleverly triangulated scheme aimed at vaulting China to full status as a major world power. Ambitious General Li, hoping to aid hundreds of millions of struggling Chinese have-nots, launches plots in North Korea, England, and Afghanistan to consolidate his power in Beijing. Working with shards of evidence, Wells races to decode the plot just hours before the Li-choreographed war erupts. Especially effective as psychological studies of men under stress are the contrasting portrayals of CIA agent Wells, warts and all, with the CIA mole who shops the United States to General Li. Berenson marshals turncoats, the Taliban, and testosterone to produce a tautly paced, credible, and gripping scenario guaranteed to buttress Berenson's niche as one of the stars in the suspense firmament. For public library suspense collections. [See Prepub Alert, LJ 10/1/07.] Barbara Conaty, Falls Church City, VA Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. From: Reed Elsevier Inc. Copyright Reed Business Information

Berenson, winner of the 2007 Edgar Award for his first novel, The Faithful Spy, proves his debut was no fluke with this stellar sequel. John Wells has recovered physically from the wounds he suffered in The Faithful Spy, but the mental scars still linger. To get back in the game, he takes an assignment in Afghanistan to investigate recent Taliban activity. What he uncovers shocks him and will lead to a disastrous attempt to recover a CIA undercover agent in North Korea and to the discovery of a mole in the CIA who is feeding secrets to a ruthless general in the Chinese government, who is, in turn, using the mole's intel to his own benefit. Wells is a fascinating, tortured soul, and his attempts to live a normal life create a gripping narrative. The authenticity Berenson brings to his ripped-from-the-headlines stories makes them seem as vividly real and scary as nonfiction or the nightly news. Ayers, Jeff. From: Syndetics Solutions, Inc. Distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.