ASSASSINS

"An exhilarating spy novel that offers equal amounts of ingenuity and intrigue." — KIRKUS In Bond's (Killing Maine, 2015, etc.) latest thriller, an intelligence operative spends decades immersed in America's struggle with Islamic terrorists. Jack is on a CIA mission in Afghanistan in 1982 to aid the Afghan opposition to Soviet invaders. But he has a personal investment, too: under his previous cover as a Peace Corps volunteer, he'd taught kids at a local village and became a blood brother to teacher Ahmad. The Americans supply the Afghans with missiles to take down Soviet helicopters, but later, after alliances shift, the CIA works to prevent a truce between the Soviet Union and Afghanistan. When the Islamic Jihad terrorist group bombs the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut in 1983, the agency sends Jack to Lebanon to gather intel. What he learns is staggering: the bombing was reputedly in retaliation for the American bombardment of Beirut villages—which was itself...