From the Tom Clancy for a new generation comes a debut thriller following two CIA outcasts who must race to stop a secret Chinese weapon that threatens to provoke a world war.
After her first assignment in Venezuela goes disastrously awry, rookie case officer Kyra Stryker is brought back to Langley to work in the Red Cell, the CIA's out-of-the-box think tank. There she's paired with Jonathan Burke, a straitlaced analyst who has alienated his colleagues with his unorthodox methods and a knack for always being right, political consequences be damned.
When a raid on Chinese spies in Taiwan ends in a shoot-out and the release of a deadly chemical, CIA director Kathy Cooke turns to the Red Cell to figure out why China is ready to invade the island nation without any fear of reprisal from the US Navy. Stryker and Burke's only lead is the top CIA asset in China, code named Pioneer. But when Pioneer reports that Chinese security has him under surveillance, Stryker is offered a chance for redemption with a highly dangerous mission: extract Pioneer from China before he's arrested and executed. The answers he holds could mean the difference between peace in the Pacific or another world war.
From CIA headquarters to the White House to a navy carrier in the South China Sea and the dark alleyways of Beijing, Red Cell takes listeners on a whirlwind race against time as Stryker and Burke work to save Pioneer and discover the hidden threat to America's power: China's top-secret weapon.
CIA analyst Mark Henshaw infuses expert knowledge of the intelligence world into a pulse-pounding plot to create a fascinating, authentic, and unforgettable read.
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Mark Henshaw began his CIA career with the agency’s office of transnational issues in 1999 as a science, weapons, and technology analyst and became a founding “plankholder” with the agency’s Information Operations Center (IOC) in 2001. In 2006, he graduated from the CIA Sherman Kent School’s Advanced Analyst Program and undertook a three-year rotation with the CIA Red Cell, a unit charged with “taking a pronounced ‘outside-of-the-box’ approach that will provoke thought and offer an alternative viewpoint on the full range of analytic issues.” During fourteen years at the CIA, he earned eighteen Exceptional Performance Awards and was the recipient of the prestigious Director of National Intelligence’s 2007 Galileo Award. He graduated from Brigham Young University in 1999 with a master’s in international relations from the David M. Kennedy School of International and Area Studies and an MBA from the Marriot School of Management.