Cold Shot-Mark Henshaw

Cold Shot Mark Henshaw Touchstone, May 20 2014, $24.99 ISBN: 9781476745572 In the Gulf of Aden, the USS Vicksburg recovers a lifeboat containing a tortured dead African. Not long after that, CIA analysts using satellite imagery notice the Iranian freighter Markarid missing a lifeboat secretly sailing towards Puerto Cabello, Venezuela. Knowing that President Diego Avila covets possessing WMDs add to the suspicion of what the ship may be carrying. CIA Red Cell desk analyst Kyra Stryker returns to the field to gather on the ground Intel in Venezuela, a place where she had issues years ago. Red Cell analyst Jonathan Burke joins her as they videotape Venezuelans with illegal nuclear distributer Hossein Ahmadi, and workers becoming ill from what might be radioactivity exposure. American President Rostow demands 100% proof that the Iranian is selling nukes to the Venezuelans; thus Stryker infiltrates the facility, but nothing goes right as all hell explodes around her and her partner. Filled with incredible depth and a strong cast, the second Stryker-Burke CIA tale (see Red Cell) may be the espionage thriller of the year as the action never slows whether at sea, data crunching at Langley or in country. Readers will enjoy this action-packed entry as early on Iranian Sargord Elham sets the table when he keeps to himself that the Tehran-connected Ahmadi made an unnecessary and foolish minor mistake in the Gulf of Aden; that seemingly harmless error enables the Americans to follow falling dominos starting from the dead African. Harriet Klausner