Ernst Grip of the Swedish security police has no idea why he’s been dispatched to a remote American military base in the Indian Ocean. Met by FBI agent Shauna Friedman, he learns that the US wants him to determine whether a prisoner they’re holding is a Swedish citizen.
The detainee, known only as “N.”, is a suspect in an Islamist-inspired terror attack in the U.S. heartland. Tortured by the CIA, he refuses to talk. Yet all the evidence points to a cabal of survivors from the devastating 2004 tsunami that struck Thailand: a ruthless American arms dealer, a Czech hit man, a mysterious nurse from Kansas, a heartbreakingly naïve Pakistani—and a Swede.
But the prisoner is not the only one harboring dangerous secrets. Grip hides a double life that will lead him into terra incognita, and Friedman, too, is not who she appears to be. In a world ruled by fear, mistrust, and deadly betrayal, these unlikely partners must learn to trust one another if they hope to stay alive.
Drawing on his military and diplomatic experience, Robert Karjel explores the uneasy repercussions of 9/11, illuminating the moral compromises that people—and nations—make in the name of security and survival.
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“Fans of Homeland, take note: A new writer of international terrorism thrillers has arrived on the scene, and he has the credentials to bring a stark sense of realism to his dark tales. A lieutenant colonel in the Swedish Air Force who has flown missions in Afghanistan and Somalia, Karjel takes readers to a black-ops site in the Indian Ocean in this tense and unsettling English-language debut.”
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