As the first book in the series, this effort does not measure up to later stories. This is understandable because Silva had to cover a lot of ground in order to set the series on its way. The later books in the series keep getting better and better.

Gabriel Allon, the protagonist, is an art restorer, who at one time worked for a secret Israeli intelligence agency. He, in fact, was one of the assassins, Golda Meir dispatched to take revenge for the Munich Olympics massacre of Israeli athletes. Allon still has nightmares and regrets for what he did and has escaped into his art restoring career. Ari Shamron, his ex-boss and an obsessive protector of everything Israeli lures him back into the game by assigning him to stop a Palestinian zealot, Tariq, who is on one last mission. Allon cannot refuse because Tariq is responsible for killing his son and injuring his wife beyond repair. He is teamed with Jacqueline Delacroix a French fashion model who is also Jewish and has a history with Allon. The plot continues from there.

In order to keep the plot moving, the characters are not as full as they become in later books. Silva, though, does a good job of presenting the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a basis for understanding Tariq's motivation. The plot has many twists in it to hold the reader's attention. There are times when it is not at all clear who is pursuing whom. Morality becomes a casualty, especially, when Shamron is involved, to say nothing of Tariq.

I'm glad I had read subsequent books so that the faults of this first effort has not and will not keep me from reading every book in the series.