Barry Eisler spent three years in a covert position with the CIA's
Directorate of Operations, then worked as a technology lawyer and
startup executive in Silicon Valley and Japan, earning his black belt at
the Kodokan International Judo Center along the way. Eisler's bestselling thrillers have won the Barry Award and the Gumshoe Award for Best Thriller of the Year, have been included in numerous "Best Of" lists, and have been translated into nearly 20 languages.
Eisler lives in the San Francisco Bay Area and, when he's not writing novels, blogs about torture, civil liberties and the rule of law.
"Requiem for an Assassin"
Rain is just coming to grips with the fact that he may be able to achieve a level of happiness with Delilah, his lover, when he receives a cryptic call from an old adversary, telling him that Dox --- perhaps Rain's only true friend --- will be killed unless Rain agrees to complete three assignments.
Without hesitation Dox walked away from a fortune in cash to save Rain's life; Rain, therefore, can do no less. After abruptly leaving Delilah, Rain embarks on a whirlwind mission that takes him from one end of the United States to the other and around the world. He commits two seemingly unconnected murders, but is unaware that his own death is the third task.
Meanwhile, Dox's life hangs in the balance. Rain discovers that, in order to rescue Dox, he must save himself as well, even as the dark side of Rain's personality threatens to overwhelm him.
The names leave me wondering why they are named what they are named.
How can he abandon his deadly persona when he needs it to survive? Who cares.
One reviewer wrote: "You'll be doing a balancing act on the edge of your chair from the first page practically to the last. However, "Requiem for an Assassin" is much more than an exquisitely written spy thriller. It is also, as with the best work of the genre, a psychological study, an up-close-and-personal illustration of the battle between light and darkness that is carried out on scales large and small on a day-by-day basis."
I did not see it that way, unfortunately, and returned the book to the library without finishing. So, I will never know what the three assignments were or whether he completed them. But, I won't lose sleep over it.
This novel lost me about a quarter of the way in.
