Grabbing another Gabriel Allon book out of a Little Library or a used bookstore is akin to ordering the large ice cream cone instead of the kid size.  You know it’s not good for you and is a waste of time (or calories in the current metaphor) but you can’t help yourself.  Soon you are flipping the pages at a feverish pace and eager to return to the book when other responsibilities take you away.

Like the other 27 books turned out with regularity by Daniel Silva, this, the fourth in the series, features our favorite Israeli assassin and intelligence officer nee world-class art restorer, Gabriel Allon.  This volume provides us with the actual assassination of his wife and young son that is a key element in subsequent books by opening with the car bombing in Vienna that claimed their lives.  Allon retreats to a small fisherman’s cottage in Cornwall providing another link to future volumes when his neighbor turns out to be young Timonthy Peel who later turns up as a Cornwall-Devon police investigator who occasionally seeks Allon’s help.

The book moves along familiar lines.  Allon is lured back into the Office (the Israeli intelligence service) by Ari Shamron, the Director of the Office and a crafty veteran of the wars against Israel who will stop at nothing to defend his nation.  Then we have the beautiful woman who falls for Allon and to top it off she’s a French fashion model, Dominique. And finally, we have the very bad guy, in this case Tariq who has been killing Jewish supporters of Israel and the Israeli ambassador to France and his wife and bodyguards.

With all these pieces in place by the first 25 pages of this 430 page tome, the action unfolds to yield another Silva trademark, the final surprise ending in which the reader’s conclusions about what happened are turned on their head.

Silly, yes.  A waste of valuable reading time, perhaps.  Fun and engaging, for sure.  If you haven’t met Gabriel Allon, you’re missing out on a fine series.  Dive in anywhere and you’ll enjoy the swim.