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43+ Works 8,357 Members 407 Reviews 41 Favorited

About the Author

After graduating from Cornell Law School in 1989, Barry Eisler spent three years with the U.S. government. For a decade thereafter he practiced various aspects of international law, including a year with the Japanese law firm of Hamada and Matsumoto in Tokyo and two years as in-house counsel at the show more Osaka headquarters of Matsushita Electric and Industrial Co., Ltd. Eisler's bestselling thrillers, have won the Barry Award and the Gumshoe Award for Best Thriller of the Year and have been included in a number "Best Of" lists. He is the author of A John Rain Thriller Ser. He is also the author of Fault Line and Inside Out. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Image credit: Annie Chernow

Series

Works by Barry Eisler

A Lonely Resurrection (2003) 917 copies
Winner Take All (2004) 778 copies
Redemption Games (2005) 720 copies
Extremis (2006) 683 copies
The Killer Ascendant (2007) 662 copies
Fault Line (2009) 585 copies
The Detachment (2011) 399 copies
The Killer Collective (2019) 388 copies
Inside Out (2010) 357 copies
Livia Lone (2016) 253 copies
The God's Eye View (2016) 204 copies
Graveyard of Memories (2014) 190 copies
The Chaos Kind (2021) 130 copies
Zero Sum (2017) 122 copies

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Reviews

I enjoyed this book. I had no idea when I picked it up that was part of a series, but that really didn't matter. The author filled in the connections among the characters and their backstories enough for this story to make sense. I would venture to say it wasn't too much explanation for someone who had read the previous books, but that's just supposition on my part. The plot held my attention and the violence wasn't overly graphic. All in all, I thought it was a good read.
 
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Woodardja | 15 other reviews | Jan 30, 2024 |
Yet another excellent thriller from Barry Eisler that brings his entire team of characters together under fire.

If you are a badass bad guy there are two offenses that you cannot do no matter what [if you want to live happily ever after]. You must not try to kill John Rain when he says no to your request to kill someone, if he rejects it leave it at that. Second, when deciding to move against him then do not try moving against his friends too since they all have extensive combat training and experience in chasing shadows because you are just getting over the head and there is no win situation here.

When unknown parties attempt to attack Livia and Rain they will start a coalition aiming first to eliminate those that aim for them but after details are leaked on the horrendous child-molesting ring within the US government itself everything moves up one level - bad guys just do not know what they got themselves into.

Loss of Ben Treven was unexpected but I guess this character was second only to Livia when it comes to mental health and ability to live normal life.

Excellent action, characters are as always great (although you might want to read some of the Rain books before this one just to be more acquainted with all of the characters).
Author always tries to talk about things that happen in real world and again he succeeds - from terrible child-molesting and slavery to high-level rich men and politicians and their goons you will find everything in this book (with very interesting links at the end for those interested in real-life events that were inspiration to the author).

Highly recommended to all Rain's, Livia's, Barry Eisler's and in general thriller fans.
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Zare | 15 other reviews | Jan 23, 2024 |
Interesting thriller about a rather dysfunctional family (second novel with similar theme in last week for me - following Kevin Wignall's "The Fragile Thing").

Ben Treven is not very social person. You wont find him talking much about his feelings or thoughts. This led to dark cloud casting its shadow on Ben's relations with his family after particularly heart-breaking incident. Since nobody talks with anybody and everything is based on assumptions tensions grow.

Ben feels his family shunned him so he seeks [and ultimately finds] his purpose in the field that looks for that exact type of person, quiet professionals - military intelligence. He moves from assignment to assignment, acting as a robot, attacking enemies of his country mercilessly until his brother Alex calls him and asks him to help him. Somebody wants Alex dead and he wants to find out who and why.

This brings Ben from the shadows and sets him on course that will test his family ties but also his relation with the army and shadowy intelligence agency he trusts fully and without reserve.

Recommended to all fans of thrillers and action.
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Zare | 95 other reviews | Jan 23, 2024 |
Excellent action thriller exposing rather dirty but ever-present industry revolving around slavery and human trafficking. It is truly horrendous how some people are willing to live off the agony of their fellow men - especially children that cannot confront and resist them in any way.

Story is told from two perspectives (changing chapter after chapter) - overview of Livia's childhood and her current actions (as acting police officer) while she is trying to find the slavers that caused her so much pain and grief.

I truly enjoy level of details author always provides in his novels (I mean how often do you find a thriller with indexes, URL links to sites with additional information and in general real-life information related to the story) and I cannot recommend this novel highly enough.

If you enjoyed Rain's novels then you will love this one.

Highly recommended to all fans of thrillers and Barry Eisler's works in general.
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Zare | 27 other reviews | Jan 23, 2024 |

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Rating
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ISBNs
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