The Last Tourist by Olen Steinhauer

Published by Minotaur Books on March 24, 2020

Olen Steinhauer is a Plotmeister. The Last Tourist is set ten years after Steinhauer’s Milo Weaver novels, a trilogy that seemed to set up further adventures involving Weaver and a Chinese spy. Instead, The Last Tourist moves in multiple directions, involving Russians and Boko Haram, before it finally circles back to the Chinese and bounces around Europe. Yet the true villain in this novel isn’t a nation or a terrorist organization, a twist that sets The Last Tourist apart from most other spy thrillers, including the earlier Milo Weaver novels.

Since I read the first three novels only after they were recently rereleased, they were fresh in my mind when I read The Last Tourist. This review might spoil some surprises in the earlier novels, so you might not want to read the full review if you plan to read the earlier Milo Weaver novels before you read The Last Tourist. If you are wondering whether you should read those books before you tackle The Last Tourist, the answer for two reasons is yes. First, because the books are excellent. Second, because it’s necessary to read them to have a full appreciation of the new novel. The Last Tourist arguably stands alone, but it stands on one leg if you haven’t read its supporting structure.

The first and third sections are set in January 2019. Parts of those sections are told from the perspective of a young CIA analyst named Abdul Ghali, a first-generation Sahrawi-American. Ghali has been chosen to make contact with Milo Weaver, who is reported to be in the Western Sahara. Ghali has been told that Weaver is working with the Massive Brigade, a violent left-wing movement that was at the heart of Steinhauer’s The Middleman. At one point, it appears that Ghali was assigned to the job not just because he is Sahwari but because he is expendable. As if usually true in a Steinhauer novel, there is more to the CIA’s choice of Ghali than meets the eye, although the truth in this shadowy world is never quite clear.

Weaver tells his story to Ghali in the second section, which fills in the ten-year gap since the last Milo Weaver novel. Weaver took over his father’s role in the Library, a clandestine organization in the bowels of the United Nations that is funded by Germany and a few countries (like Iceland) that don’t have significant intelligence services of their own. He enlisted the help of his sister Alexandra and former Tourism director Alan Drummond. He tried but failed to enlist former Tourist Leticia Jones, but she nevertheless plays a key role in the story.

From clues provided by Kirill Egerov, a former colleague of Milo’s father who is killed before Milo can meet with him, Milo discovers that a new group of Tourists are conducting strategic assassinations. But the CIA disbanded its Tourism section after nearly all the Tourists were killed. Who are these new upstarts? Answering that question sends Milo on a treacherous journey. In the novel’s third part, Milo and the few helpers he manages to enlist try to use the answers to thwart a scheme that poses a new and credible threat to the free (and not-so-free) world.

Steinhauer keeps a number of balls spinning in the air, challenging the reader to understand how they are connected. They include: pirates who are sinking cargo ships in the Philippine Sea; kidnappings of young girls by the Boko Haram; the death of a dissident blogger in Moscow; a successful communications app with undefeatable encryption; an activist for Massive Brigade who may or may not have a plan to threaten the world’s industrialists during their annual gathering at Davos; and the fate of Erica Schwartz, the alcoholic head of German intelligence who was a prominent character in two of the earlier novels.

Milo is a fascinating character because he comes full circle during the course of the four novels. In the beginning, he is an amoral killer, carrying out assassination without question because the CIA views them as necessary. After seeing the consequences of his work, and after fearing for the lives of his wife and daughter, he comes to believe that implementing foreign policy with a bullet is more harmful than helpful. Or at least, he comes to believe that his own priorities leave no room for a life of violence. By the end of The Last Tourist, Milo has changed again, adding nuance to his understanding of his role in the geopolitical world. He is no longer a remorseless killer, but he is no longer deferring moral decisions to amoral people.

Letitia undergoes a similar transformation. She also starts as a Tourist, then becomes a freelance assassin, then gains a moral sense from her revulsion to the rape and kidnapping of children by Boko Haram. Her new ethics are informed not by a rejection of violence but by a rejection of collateral damage. Even Ghali, who begins as a loyal CIA analyst and ends with a broad understanding of new risks that the world faces — some of them posed by the CIA — undergoes a transformation that compels him to make a difficult and inspiring decision.

Steinhauer is able to cram abundant plot and characterization into The Last Tourist, a novel of ordinary length, by eliminating every word that might be unnecessary. The story is a smart balance of plot development, action, characterization and atmosphere, without a hint of padding. The Last Tourist is every bit as impressive as the trilogy that preceded it, further cementing Steinhauer as the best of America’s current spy novelists.

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Salvation Lost by Peter F. Hamilton

Published by Del Rey on October 29, 2019

Salvation Lost is the second novel of the Salvation trilogy. Readers who have not read the first novel (Salvation) are cautioned that this review makes references to that novel that might be regarded as spoilers.

At the end of Salvation, I expected the direction of the trilogy to change. The novel’s “present” is set about 200 years in the future. Things are looking bleak for Earth as humans come to realize that aliens known as the Olyix are not the benevolent benefactors they seem to be, but are intent on capturing the entire human race, reducing individuals to a bodiless essence and storing them in cocoons (“a bulbous barrel of flesh with a distended head protruding at the top”) to further what seems to be (from the Olyix perspective) a divine mission. This is what happens when people (or aliens) think they are doing the work of God. Another Salvation storyline is set in the far future, focusing on the descendants of humans who fled Earth and its colonies. These future humans are plotting and training to battle the Olyix, as have generations before them. I expected the second novel to focus on the characters in the far future, but quite a bit of the novel engages the reader with familiar characters from the present, who are fighting in Earth’s end days to give the human race a chance to survive. I was happy about that because I felt a stronger attachment to the characters in the present than to those in the future.

Much of the future story deals with the crew of a starship, including characters who will be familiar to readers of Salvation. They have created what they believe will be a trap for the Olyix, with a goal of capturing one of their ships and pinpointing the location of their home base. Their larger plan is to take the war to the Olyix. The problem is that the Olyix have been around a long time and this is all “been there, done that” to them.

Much of the present story deals with efforts to thwart the Olyix as they try to snatch every human. The humans hope to slow the Olyix enough to allow substantial numbers of humans to flee — and to prepare them to keep fleeing, generation after generation, until humans ae in a position to take it to the Olyix. Peter Hamilton provides greater depth of characterization in the second novel than he did in Salvation, as we take a close look at conflicted members of a powerful family who face the prospect of losing all the wealth they’ve created.

To the story in the present, Salvation Lost adds some lowlifes who find themselves well paid to commit acts of vandalism for reasons they don’t fully understand. An entity that calls itself that watcher joins the story of the future. Hamilton eventually reveals the reason the lowlifes are being exploited and the nature of the watcher. Both revelations impart interesting twists to the plot.

The best part of Salvation, I thought, was the detailed future-building: the economic and social structures that evolve around unlimited energy, instantaneous transportation, and food printing. Salvation Lost takes that all as a given and delivers a meatier plot than the first novel. Both the past and future elements of the plot are exciting and fast-moving. Both contain surprises that spin the story in new directions.

Some of the novel’s themes are drawn from decades of science fiction, including human ingenuity and the value of self-sacrifice. While the themes are familiar, Hamilton’s imaginative use of future technology makes them seem fresh. Hamilton advances a story that rises above a typical “humans versus aliens” space opera, simply because the detailed universes in which the plots unfold are so convincing. Salvation Lost is a much stronger novel that the space-filling middle installment that so often bridges the first and last novels of a sf trilogy.

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Bridge 108 by Anne Charnock

Published by 47North on February 18, 2020

Anne Charnock always brings a fresh, intelligent approach to her science fiction. Bridge 108 takes place in a dystopian future, but Charnock's focus is not on the panicked reaction of a disintegrating society to chaotic events. Rather, in calm but forceful prose, she addresses the political and personal implications of refugees who flee to England from southern Europe to escape drought and wildfires. Her story is a nuanced look at different perspectives of human trafficking and exploitation of refugees.

Caleb and his mother were walking to England from Spain. His mother planned to bring him to a reception center, where he would receive an inoculation against addictions, a way of controlling crime and compulsions. Along the way, however, Caleb’s mother succumbed to mental illness and abandoned him. Caleb hopes to find his father, who set off ahead of them.

A young woman named Skylark found Caleb in northern France. She warned Caleb that the reception center would assign him to a work camp where he would have to serve a period of indentured labor before earning an uncertain opportunity to live an independent life. Misbehavior or a failure to learn English and the names of all the British kings could result in his deportation, while the inoculations might make him “lose his spark.” Caleb agrees to let Skylark smuggle him into England, bypassing the reception center.

As the story begins, Caleb is twelve and working for Ma Lexie. Ma Lexie is part of an extended family that has cornered the recycling business in the enclave. She depends on illegal labor for her rooftop business, which consists of sewing and repairing recycled clothing that she sells at a market. Caleb works on the rooftop, where he has proven himself adept not just at sewing but at fashion design.

Caleb takes a shine to a girl on a neighboring rooftop. They communicate by throwing messages in plastic bottles back and forth. Eventually Caleb must make a choice between staying with Ma Lexie or joining the girl on a perilous journey.

Shifting perspectives give the reader different ways of understanding the society in which Caleb lives. To an immigration agent, Caleb is a victim of human trafficking, Skylark is evil because she smuggled him into England to work as a slave, and Ma Lexie's family is evil because they exploit refugees. When we see the world from the perspective of Skylark or Ma Lexie, however, they do not seem to be people of malicious intent.

A look at the government labor camps suggests that if refugees are exploited by people like Ma Lexie, they are more viciously exploited by the government. They do miserable work in fish farms, hoping that after ten years they might be given permission to pursue legal employment — a hope that is ruthlessly quashed when the government decides it is time to reduce the ranks of migrants by making arbitrary decisions to send some back home.

Caleb is a sympathetic character who embodies the hopes and fears of most refugees. He wants a simple but decent life, a chance to work for himself and to live with dignity. The immigration agent who first encounters Caleb seems well-intentioned if a bit shifty in his approach to the truth. Skylark, despite being labeled as a human trafficker, and Ma Lexie, despite being labeled as a person who exploits slave labor, both come across as caring individuals who sincerely want to help Caleb, even if they might be helping themselves at the same time.

Charnock thus advances a subtle understanding of illegal immigration. She illustrates how people who are condemned for breaking the law, including undocumented migrants and those who help or employ them, might be offering more benefit to society than the governments who condemn them. Like the best dystopian fiction, Bridge 108 imagines the future we might become based on the direction we are headed. The novel works as a cautionary tale but it also works as a well-told story about a young man who is trying to survive on his own terms.

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The New Life of Hugo Gardner by Louis Begley

Published by Doubleday/Nan A. Talese on March 17, 2020

At 85, Hugo Gardner thinks of himself as a “tattered coat upon a stick.” He misses Valerie, to whom he was long married, but she recently left him for the younger man with whom she was sleeping. As an elderly husband he was boring, despite having once had an exciting career as a foreign correspondent and eventually as the editor of Time. While his daughter depends on him to pay tuition for his grandchildren, she otherwise sides with her mother and makes clear that she despises him. He gets along with his son, but has a vague feeling that he failed both of his children as well as his wife and grandchildren. His contacts with his son and grandkids have been “pleasant but not particularly affectionate.”

When Hugo must decide whether to have treatment to prevent his prostate cancer from metastasizing, he considers whether he wants to prolong his life and at what cost. Despite his shortcomings and the malaise they have produced, he thinks he is happy, albeit lonely. He takes joy from his garden and the birds it attracts, from walks on the beach and his writing projects, from food and drink and books and operas. If his memories are not all good, some are splendid. Hugo feels vast regret that he will die, a fate that comes closer every day, but he wants to die on his own terms: lucid, mobile, and independent.

As Hugo ponders his choices, he has occasion to go to France, where he worked for years as a journalist. He looks up some old friends, chats with them about the unlikely presidential candidate running against Hilary. He eventually contacts a former lover he abandoned for Valerie. They rehash old memories, not always pleasant (particularly from Jeanne’s perspective), but they make new ones, at least until the time comes to think about the future.

Unlike novels about seniors who look back at their lives, The New Life of Hugo Gardner is primarily about the difficulty of looking forward when not much time remains. Thinking about the future isn’t easy when there isn’t much future left. Hugo considers the future that everyone faces to be bleak, given the world’s refusal to confront the reality of global warming and its growing embrace of totalitarian leaders, but his concerns are more personal. Forming new or renewed relationships is difficult after a certain age. It is unlikely, after all, that he will find someone who will commit to a relationship that is doomed to end in the relatively near future. Even adopting a dog, only to make it an orphan, seems like a bad idea.

Or is Hugo refusing to think outside the box? He is hardly alone in his loneliness. Even much younger people feel isolated. Perhaps if he opens himself to opportunity, the rest of his days can be shared with people who care about him, even if those relationships are not what he had with Valerie or Jeanne.

The New Life of Hugo Gardner is not a novel for readers who insist on a page-turning plot. It is a contemplative character study that meanders in the nonlinear direction of thoughts that occur to an aging man. The publisher calls this novel a “comedy of manners,” but I read it as a bittersweet exploration of the nuances of aging. Hugo is far from a typical octogenarian — he is surprisingly virile for a man of his age — but he embodies the regrets of men who have lived self-absorbed lives, men who gave attention to careers rather than families and friends, who feel both betrayed and guilty as they try to chart a path forward. Hugo’s self-analysis and refusal to blame others for his faults gives him a certain charm, and his insightful commentary on life as it nears its end gives surprising weight to a light novel.

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The Boy from the Woods by Harlan Coben

Published by Grand Central Publishing on March 17, 2020

Harlan Coben seems to alternate between novels that are so-so and novels that are pretty good. The Boy from the Woods falls into the “pretty good” category. Since his last Myron Bolitar novel in 2016, he’s focused on writing stand-alones. The Boy from the Woods is a stand-alone at the moment, but the book sets up some mysteries about the protagonist’s past that invite resolution in future novels.

The Boy from the Woods imagines a senator named Rusty Eggers who is running for president. Eggers claims he wants to rebuild the country when he is only capable of pulling it apart. His rhetoric makes him popular with low-information voters while forcing everyone to choose a side instead of coming together as a nation.

The novel’s star, however, is a mysterious fellow who is aptly named Wilde — apt because he was discovered at the approximate age of six living by himself in a state forest. Since Wilde had no childhood memory of anything other than living in the woods, he believes he lived there for years until he befriended another child named David. That doesn’t seem plausible, but as events unfold, Coben sold me on the premise.

Wilde eventually went into foster care, but as an adult has continued to live in the woods, sheltered by an eco pod. David’s mother Hester has not seen much of Wilde in the six years following his involvement in a car crash that killed David. David married a woman named Laila and had a son named Matthew. Wilde is Matthew’s godfather. Sometimes he stays overnight with Laila, who keeps her distance from Wilde when she’s not using him for comfort. The relationships in this book are complicated, but they are not far-fetched.

Matthew becomes concerned about a classmate named Naomi Pine, who is always being bullied by popular kids, including Crash Maynard, whose father Dash is a documentarian. Naomi was placed for adoption by a biological mother she never knew, which gives her a bond with Wilde. The plot kicks off when Naomi disappears and ratchets up when Crash disappears. At least one of those disappearances seems to be related to pressure that Dash is receiving to release a rumored tape that shows the kind of wrongdoing that might bring down Senator Eggers. As a favor to Matthew, Wilde goes looking for Naomi, whose teacher happens to be another woman with whom Wilde has kept company at night.

I’m particularly impressed with the way the story imagines Eggers’ ability to manage obvious evidence of his unsuitability for office by denying and deflecting. Bots attack social media in ways that change the public's focus. He has bots call the evidence fake news. He has bots fabricate defenses that paint him as a victim. He has bots assert that damaging videos were obviously photoshopped. He has one set of bots make social media comments that appeal to the right and another set of bots make social media comments that appeal to the left. Then he has the bots attack each other while he stands aside and waits for a new controversy to occupy the public’s attention. So it goes in the age of easily manipulated social media.

To his credit, Coben avoided the outlandish plot development that often mars thrillers, including some of his own. The facts twist at the end, revealing a surprise in what otherwise might have been a predictable story. Another surprise follows, this one a little too manipulative, but it deals with a collateral plot thread and doesn’t overwhelm the story. The central plotline is believable, and all the more entertaining because it is convincing. Wilde has an air of mystery that substitutes for a personality (he’s a strong, silent type). I expect his personality to grow, much as Myron Bolitar’s did, as more novels explore Wilde’s past. On the strength of The Boy from the Woods, I am optimistic that those novels will be worth reading.

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