TRUST NO ONE

In Dyer’s fourth historical thriller-series installment, Office of Strategic Services agent Conor Thorn races to recover an important document during World War II.

Thorn and his wife, Emily, are both recently fired spies—he by the OSS, she by MI6. U.S. Navy Cmdr. Harry Butcher tells them that there’s a way for them both to be reinstated—all they must do is find, and possibly destroy, a secret dossier. It contains information about the Group of Five who plotted the assassination of François Darlan, the high commissioner of France for North and West Africa. If the OSS and British Special Operations Executive are implicated in the document, Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower will resign, which will be catastrophic for the Allied Forces. The catch is that the Thorns only have 10 days to locate it, and they’re not the only people searching. Dyer’s book is broken into digestible chunks, each with a time, date, and place name, and ricochets among various fictional characters (Kurt Eklof, a Nazi with an eye patch; Germaine Gilbert, the madam of a brothel) and real-life historical figures, including Butcher, Eisenhower, Nazi officer Klaus Barbie, and Winston Churchill. This creates a sense of movement and activity, but sometimes results in a lack of character development. However, a few figures, including René DuBois, an antisemite whose mother helps persecuted Jewish people, get more complex treatment. Dyer details a cold, brutal, and violent world. Conor is depicted as a hotheaded spy who mainly relies on weapons such as knives, guns, and grenades; he has a concussion that causes blackouts and memory loss, but luckily, he has someone he can trust: Emily, who’s portrayed as having learned to navigate the hypermasculine world of espionage with finesse. Overall, the period is well-researched, and the action sequences convey tension and excitement; they include the opening scene in the Basilique Notre Dame d’Afrique, another aboard the submarine Casabianca, and another involving a cemetery showdown in which Emily and Conor stave off four men.

A series entry that offers thrills, intriguing locations, and brash heroics.