The Secret Servant (Gabriel Allon Series #7) Book

Perfect page turner (and a gratifying installment in a solid series) for some over-the-pond travel. And, rather than getting bored with the series, I find it's growing on me (or, of course, the author is becoming more comfortable with his material ... or both). This one may not have been as informative as some of the others, and it lacks the heft of the holocaust-themed trilogy that anchors the first half-dozen books in the series, but (or conversely) I thought (possibly because it was a tad "lighter" or less encumbered than some of the others) it rollicked along a nice clip....

Like other books in the series, the book contains enough history and historical fiction so that readers can pat themselves on the back for learning ... something ... about historical events and political/social/global issues and relations. (OK, let's not get carried away ... the author provides just enough history/context to make readers feel less guilty for getting sucked into a shoot-em-up mischief-and-mayhem scramble...) For folks who like their action/chase/drama reading sprinkled with travel, the series tends to cover a lot of ground, but this one bounces around more than most, containing enough frenetic border-hopping to satisfying those with serious armchair wanderlust.... The same disclaimers apply here consistent with the earlier books - these books aren't high literature, and they weren't written for pacifists, the squeamish (OK, the violence can get a tad graphic at times), and I wouldn't recommend them to anti-Semites (particularly Western European anti-Semites) or folks firmly opposed (or fundamentally unsympathetic) to the State of Israel or Israel's plight, right to exist, right to defend itself, etc. But that should be obvious, right?

Of course, I'm NOT recommending that anyone start here - I've enjoyed the series (so far) in order, and there are a number of (highly) significant aspects of the story-line that build upon prior books. Sure, in any series, the number of characters ebbs and flows, and you can get by without the cumulative background or pre-requisites, but my sense is that I wouldn't have appreciated a number of the sub-plots in this one if I hadn't previously consumer the prior books.

One minor quibble - Silva likes to add little stingers or post-climax vignettes (not quite epilogues, but more along the lines of supplemental endings) ... almost like, oh, and by the way, let me trim this dangling thread too before I go.... I can't help but analogize to the teasers after the credits in the big-screen Marvel movies ... here, it seemed like the book "ended" three times, in rapidly accelerating order. Granted, each of the endings made sense, and felt right, and were consistent with the book/characters/series .... but sometimes (like in this case) the shorter endings are so abrupt/jarring that they're more disconcerting than gratifying. But hey, it's not the first time, so....

I expect I'll get to the next installment sooner rather than later.