"Secret Asset" Review

by Stella Rimington

Knopf
Hardcover
$24.95 or as low as $4.00 from Amazon.com

MI-5 Agent Liz Carlyle returns in this new thriller from Stella Rimmington. On her return from convalescing from her previous case, Carlyle hears from her informant, an Islamic bookstore owner, about a terrorist plot that is brewing. To her consternation, she is soon taken off the terrorism case to seek out a mole inside MI-5. Naturally, the two cases dovetail and Carlyle must connect the dots that are scattered before her.

Ms. Rimmington's writing has been criticized in the American press for being too plodding, with too much emphasis on the details of the investigation and too little action. But for those of us with an appreciation of British mysteries, this is our bread-and-butter. It's the detective's struggle to put the pieces of a madman's jigsaw puzzle together that we relish, and that's what makes books like "Secret Asset" a pleasure to read.