{"id":8967,"date":"2021-04-20T07:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-04-20T11:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=8967"},"modified":"2021-04-19T19:44:51","modified_gmt":"2021-04-19T23:44:51","slug":"red-widow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=8967","title":{"rendered":"Red Widow"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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By Alma Katsu \u2013 I really wanted to like this book more. Written by a former officer of both the US Central Intelligence Agency and National Security Agency, Red Widow<\/em> plunges you right into the world of partial information, hidden agendas, latent violence, and self-interested double-dealing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lyndsey Duncan is a CIA officer whose romantic attachment to an agent of Britain\u2019s MI6 has put her under a cloud. This, despite her remarkable success on her first overseas assignment. Detailed to the high-stakes Moscow Field Station, she recruited and ran an invaluable asset, Yaromir Popov, a high-ranking officer in the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service. Now she\u2019s been sent back to CIA headquarters, unsure of her future there, while an investigation drags on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the promising side, the Chief of the Russia Division, Eric Newman, wants her help in investigating the disappearance of two Russian double-agents. The coincidence suggests Russian internal security was onto them. And that information on their identity came from within CIA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In another shock, Eric tells Lyndsey that her prize, Yaromir Popov, has died of poisoning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since Lyndsey has been overseas for several years, many of the Division staff she knew have moved on. However, she recognizes one woman, Theresa Warner, whom she knew slightly in the old days. Theresa\u2019s husband was killed while conducting a sketchy Russian operation, and her colleagues regard her simply as The Widow. These two quasi-outsiders, Lyndsey and Theresa, form a friendship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The extreme compartmentalization of the Agency, particularly Lyndsey\u2019s sensitive task, means not much job-related information can be exchanged, but author Katsu doesn\u2019t give the women any other common interests\u2014movies, tennis\u2014that they could share. As a result, the basis for their relationship is thin and feels contrived.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Katsu does what I assume is a creditable job describing operational constraints and office operations within the CIA\u2014who can talk to whom, when, and about what. The big reveal the women experience isn\u2019t much of a surprise for readers of espionage fiction, nor is what they do with that knowledge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Additional plot information risks being a spoiler. Suffice it to say that, even if Lyndsey and Theresa\u2019s actions are a tad predictable, they remain interesting characters. The bigger problem is that the male characters didn\u2019t come across as real, three-dimensional people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Authors worry, maybe a little, sometimes a lot, that friends and family will think they recognize themselves among a novel\u2019s characters. (They\u2019re almost always wrong about this.) Perhaps Katsu was hampered in writing about a world she knows so well, precisely to avoid any such misconceptions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reading Red Widow<\/em>, you come away with a strong impression of what it\u2019s like to work in a clandestine service, the resources at your disposal, those withheld from you, and the cynicism of many of the participants. You won\u2019t develop a strong affinity for many of the people involved, and perhaps that\u2019s part of the game.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Order it from Amazon here<\/a> or from Indiebound here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Alma Katsu \u2013 I really wanted to like this book more. Written by a former officer of both the US Central Intelligence Agency and National Security Agency, Red Widow plunges you right into the world of partial information, hidden … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Red Widow - The challenges facing women CIA officers overseas and at home, from a thriller writer who's lived it.","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[193,126,32,1],"tags":[1851,1852],"class_list":["post-8967","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-espionage","category-reading-2","category-thriller","category-uncategorized","tag-alma-katsu","tag-red-widow"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2NkiT-2kD","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8967","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8967"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8967\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8974,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8967\/revisions\/8974"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8967"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8967"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8967"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}