“Plenty of breathless one-more-chapter, stay-up-late suspense wrapped around a meaty and timely story … irresistible.” — Lee Child
To find a Russian mole in the White House, an FBI agent must question everything. . . and trust no one
To save America from a catastrophic betrayal, an idealistic young FBI agent must stop a Russian mole in the White House in this exhilarating political thriller … mole in the White House in this exhilarating political thriller reminiscent of the early novels of John Grisham and David Baldacci.
No one was more surprised than FBI Agent Peter Sutherland when he’s tapped to work in the White House Situation Room. From his earliest days as a surveillance specialist, Peter has scrupulously done everything by the book, hoping his record will help him escape the taint of his past. When Peter was a boy, his father, a section chief in FBI counterintelligence, was suspected of selling secrets to the Russians—a catastrophic breach that had cost him his career, his reputation, and eventually his life.
Peter knows intimately how one broken rule can cost lives. Nowhere is he more vigilant than in this room, the sanctum of America’s secrets. Staffing the night action desk, his job is monitoring an emergency line for a call that has not—and might never—come.
Until tonight.
At 1:05 a.m. the phone rings. A terrified young woman named Rose tells Peter that her aunt and uncle have just been murdered and that the killer is still in the house with her. Before their deaths, they gave her this phone number with urgent instructions: “Tell them OSPREY was right. It’s happening. . . “
The call thrusts Peter into the heart of a conspiracy years in the making, involving a Russian mole at the highest levels of the government. Anyone in the White House could be the traitor. Anyone could be corrupted. To save the nation, Peter must take the rules into his own hands and do the right thing, no matter the cost. He plunges into a desperate hunt for the traitor—a treacherous odyssey that pits him and Rose against some of Russia’s most skilled and ruthless operatives and the full force of the FBI itself.
Peter knows that the wider a secret is broadcast, the more dangerous it gets for the people at the center. With the fate of the country on the line, he and Rose must evade seasoned assassins and maneuver past jolting betrayals to find the shocking truth—and stop the threat from inside before it’s too late.
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This story is impossible to put out of mind… Relevant and revealing, this is one of the best thrillers to come along in years.
Plenty of breathless one-more-chapter, stay-up-late suspense wrapped around a meaty and timely story… Irresistible.
“The Night Agent” by Matthew Quirk features Peter Sutherland, an FBI agent, and Rose Larkin, someone he meets through work. Readers gain insight into Sutherland’s public personality through his friendly banter with fellow employees. He has a deeper private side resulting from a past family impropriety that haunts him constantly. He is careful about the rules, avoiding even the slightest hint of impropriety, but no matter how faultless he is, he cannot not escape that nagging past.
“It was a long time ago, but there were moments, like now, when the past would come at him so vividly, a stab of pain. It was like stepping on a tiny piece of glass a month after you thought you’d swept up all the shards.”
Sutherland works a night agent, covering the phones, holding down the fort while everyone else sleeps. His job is important, more important than he knows, even though 284 nights have passed without a phone call. He spends his working life tied to that phone that never rings, and then, one night at 1:05 AM, it does.
“He’s here. He’s inside. He’s going to kill me. It’s happening in six days. We have the red ledger.”
Characters are genuine and sympathetic. Readers follow Rose and Peter; their everyday actions are intermixed with the out-of-the-ordinary and terrifying. Both are playing with hidden cards. There are other participants as well, and the narrative goes slightly back and forth in time to look at both spies and spy-hunters. Who are these people? What are they are doing in the time surrounding specific events? What is their function and purpose? How much do they know and what did they pass on? H how did they get to where they are without people discovering their deception? Everyone at every level has both something to hide and something that should be made public.
Little details draw reader into the setting and action. The tension is palatable.
“Two steps. The floor flexed beneath her. The shadows shifted under the door. She clamped her eyes shut. The man moved closer, and the knob rattled softly as a hand closed around it.”
“The Night Agent” is a thrilling game of international politics, espionage, and treachery that reaches into the highest levels of government. I was given a review copy of “The Night Agent” by Matthew Quirk, William Morrow, and Edelweiss. Readers will never quite know who is to be trusted and who is to be feared and will keep turning page after page to find out
The book is taut, and I read it for two days with a tight breath. There is no clever plot here, but the realism and the connection to events taking place in the United States, France, and other sites where campaigns of influence and intervention in democratic processes took place by various elements. The plot develops, and the mystery solved to a very high level.
This is a great action book! The hero is an FBI agent who is too nosy for his own good. His late father was accused of treason and died before the charges were ever proved or disproved. He becomes involved in finding Russian spies in the American government. It is a wild ride that in the end also brings some closure to his father’s actions. Looking forward to the next book by this author.
Good political thriller especially in the current political climate.
After reading Hour of the Assassin, I bought this book, and will read anything written by this author. Hard to put his books down. They keep your attention all through.
Dragged a little at times
Great book
Interesting characters, the plot twists and keeps you interested. You want to keep reading to find out what is going to happen next!
Matthew quirk is one hell of a writer. the night agent is a truly original, all engrossing tale of life inside the WhiteHouse during a crisis. Taut, fast, thrilling, inventive and breath-taking, this is right up there with Lee Child and David Baldacci. Well worth a read.
Good read.
The plot was involving and kept moving. Writing is strong but overall, not exactly a barn burner.