The Swimmer
A Novel
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4.6 • 5 Ratings
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
International Bestseller
A deep-cover CIA agent races across Europe to save the daughter he never knew in this electrifying debut thriller—an international sensation billed as “Homeland meets Stieg Larsson” that heralds the arrival of a new master sure to follow in the footsteps of Stieg Larsson, John Le Carré, and Graham Greene
“A terrific globe-trotting page-turner, rich with complex conflicts and a big, meaty, chillingly credible conspiracy.” —Chris Pavone, author of The Expats and The Accident
In the end, you cannot hide who you are.
Klara Walldéen was raised by her grandparents on a remote archipelago in the Baltic Sea, learning to fish and hunt and sail a boat through a storm. Now, as an EU Parliament aide in Brussels, she is learning how to navigate the treacherous currents of international politics: the lines between friend and enemy, truth and lies.
But Klara has accidentally seen something she shouldn’t have: a laptop containing information so sensitive that someone will kill to keep hidden. Suddenly, she is thrown into a terrifying chase across Europe, with no idea who is hunting her or why.
Meanwhile, in Virginia, an old spy hides from his past. Once, he was a man of action, an operative so dedicated that he abandoned his infant daughter to keep his cover. Now, he is the only man who can save Klara . . . and she is the only woman who can allow him to lay old ghosts to rest.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Swedish author Zander's entertaining first novel owes more to Forsythe and Ludlum than to Larsson and Mankell. An unnamed narrator, who is a retired spy living in Virginia, addresses his late wife in his mind, telling her a convoluted tale that begins with her death and continues across the world over the next 33 years. Meanwhile, Mahmoud Shammosh, who's in a Ph.D. program at Uppsala University, is working on a book about the privatization of war when he hears from an old friend who has information proving that the CIA and private contractors used torture on captured terrorists. Shammosh ends up with the info and goes on the run with his former lover, Klara Walld en, an E.U. parliament aide. Given Zander's literate, descriptive style, it's easy to see why this thriller has been a bestseller in Europe, though American readers may find it overlong in arriving at the inevitable conclusion.
