The best spy thriller ever penned  by the master of suspense
924029
Ask your standard movie fan which Alistair MacLean adaptation they prefer and the vote would most likely be split between THE GUNS OF NAVARONE and WHERE EAGLES DARE, but, whilst I absolutely love the latter of those two, my personal favorite has been for many years WHEN EIGHT BELLS TOLL - a spy thriller penned by MacLean in the late 1960s and filmed with Anthony Hopkins in the lead role in 1971.
I saw the movie many years ago on British television and always longed to see it once more. My prayers were answered when it was finally announced for DVD release in Region 2. Armed with a new region-free DVD player, I ordered it and anxiously checked my Maryland mailbox every day until its arrival. UPDATE - Kino Lorber have announced this movie is to be released in the US in 2016 on both DVD and Blu-ray - I am over the moon with excitement.
Watching it once again after all these years my passion for this action adventure is unfailing, I consider this to be the best spy thriller that [Bond producers] EON Productions NEVER made.
With a simply superb cast that sees Hopkins joined by Robert Morley (as a rather snobbish boss) and Jack Hawkins (as a suspicious millionaire) this movie is simply brimming over with "Bondian" elements that include beautiful girls (bad and good), thrilling action, underwater battles, building suspense and a roaring soundtrack. It's the most entertaining couple of hours of spy thriller action that I have had the opportunity to enjoy in almost two decades.
Hopkins plays secret agent Calvert who travels to the coast of Scotland disguised as a marine biologist to investigate the disappearance of bullion ships in the Irish Sea. There he encounters a colorful array of characters, both friend and foe before a climactic battle in an underground boathouse.
The Region 2 DVD sports a fine transfer with only the theatrical trailer as a special feature. Still it is very entertaining and well worth putting your hard earned cash for. I simply cannot recommend it strongly enough.
3564542
Prepare to be thrust into the middle of an action-packed thriller, starting on page 1. Author Mark Henshaw wastes no time on preambles or stage-setting; bullets are flying by page 3, with a rookie CIA agent as their target. How she gets from streets of Caracas to the alleys of Beijing and then to the deck of an aircraft carrier under full attack is as fascinating a tale as you'll find in any book written in the last 20 years.

"Red Cell" is written as a series of action vignettes -- seemingly unrelated at first, but finely detailed and deftly worked together like puzzle pieces until the reader finally sees the entire picture.

If you can't put down the best efforts of Tom Clancy or Dan Brown, you're going to love this book as well. Grab a copy and settle in for one of the most intriguing spy thrillers you're likely to read this year or next.
1773786
Assassins is one of the best of the Noon spy novels.  The series includes both classic private eye novels and other novels featuring Noon as a secret special agent who reports directly to the President himself via a special phone in Noon's office.

Here, Noon is assigned to secretly protect an elder statesman on the way to Europe for historical negotiations.  Finding that the politician has booked passage on the world's fastest cruise ship, Noon joins the voyage and proceeds to be on hand to secretly protect the politician.  Along the way, however, Noon encounters a massive sumo wrestler, the world's sexiest woman, and others.

This is a well -written, smoothly plotted novel that is easy to read and features Avallone at his best.
1098007
Charles Cummings is the writer standing in the gold medal spot at the Spy Thriller Olympics. The Spanish Game is brilliant. Page after page it keeps you hooked. It reads fast and it keeps you guessing: where's this turn and twist taking me now?  Being familiar with Spain and Spanish customs I can say with certitude that Cummings has the setting bang on. The characters and the plot are colourful and very much alive. You want a good, entertaining, and extremely well written spy novel? Look no further. You will enjoy this one!
1620929
Several centuries ago in his "Essays:Of Studies",Francis Bacon wrote:"Some books are to be tasted,others to be swallowed;and some few to be chewed and digested". Robert Crais's "The Last Detective" eaily falls in the realm of the third category with its explosive suspense,taut language and a cutting edge. This is a colossal suspense thriller that reflects the contemporary American author's exemplar of grouping inexplicable facets of suspense and gifting them the shape and size of words. This is a great thriller that would keep the reader on tenterhooks for a long,long time.

Elvis Cole is a private investigator who has made Los Angeles his abode and is spending some quite and refreshing days with Ben Chenier,his girlfriend Lucy Chenier's 10-year-old son. But all fantasies of smoothness and placidity escape out of the window when Ben mysteriously disappears from his house and is confirmed to be kidnapped. A beliguered mother,a hysterical father(Richard Chenier) and the distrust of the concerned authorities were never enough obstacles for Elvis to contend with in his race against time to recover the boy but when his past rushes catastrophically to his present and haunt him severely,Elvis comprehends that it's a trifle too much to undertake the adventure on his own and invokes Joe Pike,his trusted but enigmatic friend who also happens to be an ex-Marine.

Teaming up with Joe and the Juvenile Section detective Carol Starkey,Elvis decides to brush the kidnappers' threat aside and safely claw out Ben from their net. But it was never easy,it's never so and neither will it ever be and as Elvis turns over the pages of his very own history,he's mystified and aghast at his army days. He can't fathom the validity of the atrocity that the kidnappers allege he committed during the Vietnam War but time teaches him that it's all a decoy. Joe,Elvis and Carol piece out the puzzle but realise that they must be discreet and on top of teir game to master a criminal who's turning out to be an international criminal.....

This is Elvis and Joe's ninth case together and is really a genuine jewel for all fanatics of suspense thrillers. But "The Last Detective" isn't just a regular thriller steeped in one-dimensional perspective;Robert Crais lends,and lends successfully,a pluraristic touch to his novel. The maddening,and at times flattering,grief of a father whose son has been kidnapped,the petrified image of a mother whose child is amidst uncertain propositins and a man's desperation to undo his guilt are superbly mirrored in the principle characters of the book. Crais's graphic portrayal of the terrifying images of the Vietnam War framed in a woodwork of guilty reflections accentuates  yet another dimension to his work.

"The Last Detective" is a fantastic mystery book deeply soaked in hair-raising adventure. Every word---and virtually every letter---sends around a rippling sense of awe and apprehension and there's not a line that's out of the context. Robert Crais is focussed,ambitious and clear in his work decipher a disdain of anticlimax when the solution comes out into the daylight before the end of the book,he should confess that the ation that follows thereafter augments to the book's charm. "The Last Detective" is a superbly drawn thriller,one that is to be read,and re-read and savour.
4288798
The incredible true-life story of Ashraf Marwan, the Egyptian spy who worked for the Mossad before, during, and after the landmark October 1973 War, receives the full treatment it finally deserves by Uri Bar-Joseph, the worlds top authority on the intelligence failure prior to the 1973 War. Not only do we get a gripping real-life spy thriller, we are treated to analytic explanations of why certain events occurred, analysis that is based on incomplete evidence, but that professors Bar-Joseph so admirably explains. For the first time, we are told how important Marwans information was to the war effort. Bar-Joseph concludes that without Marwans warning, the Golan Heights would have fallen in the second day of the war, as the reserves that saved it would not have been called up. Similarly, an Egyptian rocket attack that was intercepted as the Israeli Air Force knew the Egyptian battle plan, would have killed dozens or more in Tel Aviv. Nor were Marwans activities limited to the 1973 War. He warned the Mossad of a plot to shoot down an Israeli air liner with four hundred passengers in Rome. This plot was quickly foiled. Perhaps the biggest question of all, why Marwan chose to spy for Israel, is attributed to his large ego, but most of all to his need for excitement and action. In sum, this book is not only action-packed, but insightful as well. Highly recommended!
950045
One of the best spy novels I have ever read. Must read for all who love the spy game....a true thriller.
1276371
Six Years has all the hallmarks of Harlan Coben's works. No other author can build a plot like he does. Each segment of the story seems so unrelated to the others, you're left utterly intrigued as to he how they all fit together. That's how he reels you in and not until the final chapters does the jigsaw start to set in place. When it does, you get such a huge sense of satisfaction, you can't wait till he writes the next one. This is thriller writing at its best.
627948
The classic spy novel that allowed John le Carre to write full time for the rest of his life does not disappoint.  From start to finish it engaged my attention.  Having read in the blurbs where Malcolm Gladwell said he had read it every five years from the age of fifteen and that it was only at the third reading that he really understood it, I was keen to grasp the outcome fully and believe I did.  The well communicated atmosphere of the Cold War and the time shortly after the Berlin Wall had segregated East and West Berlin acts as the darkly oppressive scene setting.  Although, George Smiley, the main character of le Carre's several later novels is only briefly revealed, Alec Leamas fills this tome with his world-weariness and brief hope and joy in the face of a duplicitous secret service that hints of the sort of world we were and are now very much aware of living in where multitudes of shades of grey exist and expediency and deeper, darker motives drive governments and their ever more secret intelligence arms: with a hellish or purgatory-like atmosphere.  People remark that le Carre will be widely read in future generations.  I can well believe it.  Superbly written and a great introduction to the le Carre world we are seeing more and more of in film and television including the recent gripping "The Night Manager"
3846312
I  haven't enjoyed a spy thriller this much in ages. It was just so good, The plot grabs you and just doesn't stop. Rarely am I surprised, and Bauer managed it repeatedly in this book.
And managing to slip in the romance - yes, please! Seriously, I'd love to see this made into a movie. It's too bad I can ONLY give it 5 stars. I highly recommend it
2575221
This book along with is prequel "The Folks at Fifty Eight"  is without a doubt the most enjoyable espionage story I have ever read. It is superior to the works of Grahame Greene and all the others in my opinion. I would like to see more of Michael Patrick Clark.
4680669
well a real gem from Alistair MacLean. This book was recommended by a friend of mine who along with her husband are avid readers and can devour books!! After reading the book i literally thanked her,because this book is a real winner....
 A taut thriller which entertains, mystifies,keeps the readers guessing and.... sweating!
 a suspense thriller brilliantly written i highly recommend this book to all suspense fans! This book has everything submarines.... the arctic.... the ice.... the chills....the thrills......
 a real page turner and an edge of the seat thriller this one simply doesn't let you down....... go right ahead if you haven't already!
4763821
Hitler's Daughter is one of those well-written suspence, action, thriller novels with hidden clues and superb twists throughout the exciting and plausible plot. It is the kind of book that you start during an airplane trip and find yourself reading in your hotel room instead of going out to some fancy restaurant. This book won the West Coast Review of Books "Porgie Award" as one of the 3 best original paperback novels of the year. That almost automatically suggests that a movie will follow. It did. But the book is far, far, far better than the movie.  This guy knows how to write a real thriller. And his second novel "The Ardennes Tapes" was just as good.
4295860
Frederick Forsyth is a master of 'spy' story telling. This book was my starter to Forsyth's other works. The story line and the facts presented in  THE NEGOTIATOR is enticing by giving complete details as if I was in the  story with Quinn. The plot is  shocking due to many twists and exploding  action along the story. The characters are well developed and carried the  suspense till the end.  This book is an ultimate satisfaction. Because of  this book, which made me fall in love with Forsyth's work, I bought the  following books:- Icon, The Deceivers and Devil's Alternative.
1785446
Reza Kahlili's "A Time to Betray" has every element of a classic spy novel thriller told from a first-person account of someone who witnessed the Iranian Revolution and the horrifying events that followed.  This book contains a little bit of every theme: Persian culture, history of Iran, Islam, friendship, betrayal, horror, indoctrination, loyalty, and even some brief comedy.  The author describes in detail the atrocities committed by the brutal Revolutionary Guards, with whom he becomes entangled.  His conscience eventually leads him to risk everything--including the safety of his own family--to expose the true evils of the Islamic Republic of Iran by spying for the CIA from the inside.  I gave this book 5 stars without hesitation.
1192948
Written like an excellent spy novel with a technical twist.  What a GREAT author.  Moving and dynamic.  Goes "undercover" to bring you the nitty gritty of C5 development.  On again, off again drama, personnel changes, the good guys, and the bad guys.  I have read thousands of books in my lifetime, but this book is written in such a manner that you will NOT want to put it down and you will go back to it till ya finish.  I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS READ.
2975931
For years I've been looking for the ultimate kick-ass action thriller. Now I've finally hit paydirt, thanks to a friend who recommended that I read Inside Out by Barry Eisler. To say I wasn't disappointed would be a gross understatement. Fact is, this outstanding suspense novel knocked my socks off. I honestly can't say I've ever read a better book within this genre.

A lot of things stand out in this novel. With Ben Treven and Daniel Larison, Eisler has created a pair of ultra-tough, ass-kicking hombres who make Robert Crais's Joe Pike look like a sissy. But the appeal this novel holds for me doesn't end with the characters and the action. By broaching the subject of the use of torture (or "enhanced interrogation techniques") in America's War on Terror, Eisler provides a scathing critique of U.S. foreign policy during the Bush/Cheney years.

This was the first book I read by this author, and it sure as hell won't be my last. Eisler is way up there in the pantheon of outstanding suspense writers.