Mark Henshaw’s forthcoming spy thriller, The Last Man In Tehran (Published by Touchstone Books), is the fourth novel in his Red Cell series.
Following last year’s The Fall Of Moscow Station, the new novel brings back Kyra Stryker, now the leader of the Red Cell unit–who re-partners with retired Chief Jonathan Burke and his wife, the former Director of the CIA–to help find a number of moles within the Central Intelligence Agency who’ve gone rogue and are aiding the Mossad.
Here are the official plot details for The Last Man In Tehran, in stores on July 11th:
“New Red Cell Chief Kyra Stryker has barely settled into the job when an attack on an Israeli port throws the Middle East into chaos. The Mossad—Israel’s feared intelligence service—responds with a campaign of covert sabotage and assassination, determined to protect the homeland. But evidence quickly turns up suggesting that a group of moles inside Langley are helping Mossad wage its covert war.
Convinced that Mossad has heavily penetrated the CIA’s leadership, the FBI launches a counterintelligence investigation that threatens to cripple the Agency—and anyone who questions the official story is suspect. With few officials willing to help for fear of getting accused, Kyra turns to her former mentors—now-retired Red Cell Chief Jonathan Burke and his wife, former CIA Director Kathryn Cooke—to help uncover who is trying to tear the CIA apart from the inside out.”
If you love spy books and haven’t read Henshaw’s series, you’re missing out on some of the most authentic espionage thrillers out there. Where guys like Brad Taylor, Andrews & Wilson, Joshuah Hood, and A.J. Tata write action from a been-there-done-that approach, Henshaw is one of the few authors who brings experience from having worked at the CIA.
According to his author bio, Henshaw started with the CIA in 1999 as a Science, Weapons & Technology analyst for the Agency’s Office of Transnational Issues before he became a founding “plankholder” with the Agency’s Information Operations Center in 2001.
After that, he graduated from the CIA Sherman Kent School’s Advanced Analyst Program, then joined the Red Cell unit, where he spent three years “taking a pronounced ‘outside-of-the-box’ approach that will provoke thought and offer an alternative viewpoint on the full range of analytic issues.”
As you can see from his background, few thriller writers can provide the kind of insight about the ins and outs of the spy world that Henshaw offers with his novels. While his first couple of books have a very raw feeling to them, The Fall Of Moscow Station was a well-rounded story, and his best work yet. It’ll be interesting to see how he follows that up with The Last Man In Tehran this summer!
