Close Call: A Liz Carlyle Novel - Tapa dura

"Welcome a new queen of the genre . . . Stella Rimington, who was the first female director of MI-5, knows of what she writes." --The Washington Times, on the Liz Carlyle series

"[Rimington] bids to join the ranks of such Secret-Agent authors as Graham Greene [and] John Le Carre." --The Wall Street Journal, on the Liz Carlyle series

"Cyber-sabotage, unmanned drones, Cold War chills and Marseilles mazes all add up to an up-all-night thriller you will love. Do not miss any Rimington books for a first hand peek at the real thing." --Mystery Lovers Review, on the Liz Carlyle series

"Rimington blends the inner workings of spycraft with edge-of-your-seat drama as the story develops, with the action moving from the Middle East into Europe. Readers of Rimington have come to expect intrigue and action, drama and romance....Stella Rimington again takes us inside the fight against terrorism, and again gives us a read we can't put down until the end." --The Free Lance-Star

The Arab Spring has swept through the Middle East and Liz Carlyle and her compatriots in the Thames House's counter-espionage division are racing to investigate arms deals in Yemen. There's a UN embargo forbidding any member country from supplying arms to either side in the uprisings, but Andy Bokus, head of the CIA's London Station, has evidence that the weapons being smuggled into Yemen are not only being sold to both sides, but are coming from a connection in the UK-a highly embarrassing black mark on the government and, if true, full of disastrous consequences.

British-American cooperation widens as Liz teams up with her old rival Bruno McKay, MI6's Head of Station in Paris, and Isobel Florian of the French domestic service, the DCRI, to trail and trap the elusive weapons dealer. The evidence points to a former French intelligence officer, Antoine Milraud, who leads them all on a mad chase across Europe until investigators witness him passing something to an elegantly dressed, very mysterious man.

When Milraud is caught and informs on his fellow conspirators, Liz finds herself embroiled in a larger, potentially explosive situation that twists all the way back to what she feared most-that the arms are being sold through the UK, and the mysterious man is closer and more capable of brutal violence than she ever could have imagined.