Milo Weaver used to be a “tourist” for the CIA—an undercover agent with no home, no identity—but he’s since retired from the field to become a middle-level manager at the CIA’s New York headquarters. He’s acquired a wife, a daughter, and a brownstone in Brooklyn, and he’s tried to leave his old life of secrets and lies behind. However, when the arrest of a long-sought-after assassin sets off an … an investigation into one of Milo’s oldest colleagues and exposes new layers of intrigue in his old cases, he has no choice but to go back undercover and find out who’s holding the strings once and for all.
In The Tourist, Olen Steinhauer—twice nominated for an Edgar Award—tackles an intricate story of betrayal and manipulation, loyalty and risk in an utterly compelling novel that is both thoroughly modern and yet also reminiscent of the espionage genre’s luminaries: Len Deighton, Graham Greene, and John LeCarré.
more
I received the first three novels in this series from Netgalley and the publisher, and I’m so glad I started the series. Book 1 was great and I do highly recommend it to readers who enjoy espionage/spy/thriller types. I’m hooked and will finish the next two from Netgalley, and definitely get the final book, number 4, coming out in 2020. Loved this book from beginning to end.
3.5 stars rounded down to 3 stars. The premise of this story is so far fetched that it stretches the imagination. Milo Weaver is the head of a secret group called “The Library.” The Library is a secret intelligence sharing group of 12 countries based in a secret part of UN headquarters in New York city.
The 12 countries are Germany, Luxembourg, Iceland, Kenya, Bangladesh, Ghana, Portugal, Algeria,South Korea, Lebanon and Chile. They send intelligence to the Library, which stores and collates it, building up patterns of information. They then use this information to get favors from China, US, Russia and the UK. Some of the information that they have is hard to believe, i.e., secret codes of Japanese intelligence.
However, if you accept this premise, then it is an exciting, suspenseful spy book full of betrayal, double crosses and many plot twists. This is book 4 in the series and it explains some of what happened in previous books. The Tourists were a group of CIA assassins who worked worldwide. It was disbanded after Chinese intelligence killed a couple dozen of them in 1 day.
One of the groups involved in this story is a private security contractor. Another is a internet app called Nexus, similar to Facebook.
Thanks to St Martin’s Press for sending me this eARC through NetGalley.
#TheLastTourist
I read the third book in the series and it was so good and I was able to keep up. But I decided to go back and start the series at the beginning with this book and am so glad I did. This is Milo Weaver’s story and it is very intense and a great read that is hard to put down once you begin. A fantastic glimpse into the world of espionage that will leave your head spinning. After retirement, Milo is called back to work as an undercover ‘tourist’ for the CIA to solve a mystery that involves one of his former friends and colleague. This is a page-turner. Well written and a fantastic book to read. I read a free copy via Net Galley and voluntarily chose to write a review.
Oh there are spys and CIA and FBI not to mention the the departments that are within the departments! I was a little skeptical when I started reading this book but after a few pages I was totally hook great thriller! Thanks so much!!
This book introduced me to Olen Steinhauer and now I eagerly await each new novel. He does put a new and captivating twist to his spy stories.
I’ve had this one on my TBR list for a while now, and when NetGalley offered the first three Milo Weaver books as an immediate download (in preparation for the fourth title, forthcoming in March of 2020), I jumped at the chance to own them all AND the forced excuse to bump them to the top of the list. I’ve read other Steinhauer books and enjoyed them, plus I am a longtime fan of spy books, so The Tourist seemed like a sure bet.
I wasn’t wrong. (Don’t you love when that happens?)
Steinhauer has done a marvelous job creating a world of spies and secrets that was sufficiently familiar to make me nervous yet sufficiently original to keep me engaged. The concept of the Tourists/Tourism Office is chilling in its simultaneous believability AND novelty, and that’s what made this book so resonant I think. Add in a hero-turned-Everyman-turned-hero-again in Milo Weaver, enough twisty-turny deception and red herrings to make Dashiell Hammett proud, and a plot that winds around on itself like an ouroboros and the result is a fabulous read that captured my attention and imagination and held on to both with both hands.
There’s a dark underbelly (even more so than you think) here, and that turn toward the end almost lost me – until I realized its potential and necessity for setting up the future series. I can’t wait to see what the world holds in store for Milo from this point forward – and to me, that’s the surest hallmark of Steinhauer’s success here.
Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for my review copy.
Good book
It’s been quite a while since I’ve curled up with a spy novel, so maybe I’m out of the loop on the genre, but The Tourist left me somewhere in the fair to midland range. There’s a lot of dialogue and the story is repetitive at times, plus there are several things that seem to rely on everyone, including Milo, being either oblivious or not very bright, both of which seem out of sorts with a spy novel. In the end, The Tourist left me wanting more – more action, more intrigue, more tension, just more. It isn’t a bad story, but it isn’t a particularly great one either.
What all good spy novels should aspire to. To say that I couldn’t put the book down was an understatement. Read it through the night and never realized that it was dawn.
Well written spy novel. I liked it so much , I have read 2 more in the series. I am very fond of Milo!
Great series
Very well written- good characters
One of the best books I have ever read…engrossing!