THE ENGLISH ASSASSIN

The excellent John Lee performs this international thriller with the cool aplomb we would expect from the bankers, spies, diplomats, and assassins who populate it. Art theft from Jewish citizens during the Hitler years and the premise that Hitler could not have financed his war without the help of Swiss bankers provide Daniel Silva with the perfect background for a story of accusations, suppositions, intrigue, betrayal, and murder. Sometime Israeli special agent and art restorer Gabriel Allon is hired to restore a Raphael. He finds his employer, a Swiss banker, murdered. Silva's plot and John Lee's performance take us into places we've wondered about but have never seen, and to places we never even dreamed existed. It's a world in which paranoia is what keeps people alive. S.J.H. (c) AudioFile 2002, Portland, Maine [Published: AUG/SEP 02]