The Kill Artist [Paperback]

Daniel Silva (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback
• Publisher: Signet Books (1998)
• ASIN: B001LC2E1E
• Product Dimensions: 6.7 x 4.2 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (136 customer reviews)

More About the Author

He has been called his generation's finest writer of international intrigue and one of the greatest American spy novelists ever. Compelling, passionate, haunting, brilliant: these are the words that have been used to describe the work of #1 New York Times-bestselling author Daniel Silva.

Silva burst onto the scene in 1997 with his electrifying bestselling debut, The Unlikely Spy, a novel of love and deception set around the Allied invasion of France in World War II. His second and third novels, The Mark of the Assassin and The Marching Season, were also instant New York Times bestsellers and starred two of Silva's most memorable characters: CIA officer Michael Osbourne and international hit man Jean-Paul Delaroche. But it was Silva's fourth novel, The Kill Artist, which would alter the course of his career. The novel featured a character described as one of the most memorable and compelling in contemporary fiction, the art restorer and sometime Israeli secret agent Gabriel Allon, and though Silva did not realize it at the time, Gabriel's adventures had only just begun. Gabriel Allon appears in Silva's next nine novels, each one more successful than the last: The English Assassin, The Confessor, A Death in Vienna, and Prince of Fire, The Messenger, The Secret Servant, Moscow Rules, and The Defector. Silva's forthcoming novel, The Rembrandt Affair, will be published on July 20, 2010.

Silva knew from a very early age that he wanted to become a writer, but his first profession would be journalism. Born in Michigan, raised and educated in California, he was pursuing a master's degree in international relations when he received a temporary job offer from United Press International to help cover the 1984 Democratic National Convention in San Francisco. Later that year Silva abandoned his studies and joined UPI fulltime, working first in San Francisco, then on the foreign desk in Washington, and finally as Middle East correspondent in Cairo and the Persian Gulf. In 1987, while covering the Iran-Iraq war, he met NBC Today National Correspondent Jamie Gangel and they were married later that year. Silva returned to Washington and went to work for CNN and became Executive Producer of its talk show unit including shows like Crossfire, Capital Gang and Reliable Sources.

In 1995 he confessed to Jamie that his true ambition was to be a novelist. With her support and encouragement he secretly began work on the manuscript that would eventually become the instant bestseller The Unlikely Spy. He left CNN in 1997 after the book's successful publication and began writing full time. Since then all of Silva's books have been New York Times and international bestsellers. His books have been translated in to more than 25 languages and are published around the world. Silva continues to reside in Washington with his wife and teenage twins Lily and Nicholas. When not writing he can usually be found roaming the stacks of the Georgetown University library, where he does much of the research for his books. He is currently at work on a new Gabriel Allon novel and warmly thanks all those friends and loyal readers who have helped to make the series such an amazing success.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

108 of 111 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Plot Artist, July 6, 2006

By 

T. K. Kenyon "Author" - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Kill Artist (Mass Market Paperback)

This book is chronologically the first in the Gabriel Allon series.

Chronological Order:
1. The Kill Artist
2. The English Assassin
3. The Confessor
4. Death in Venice
5. Prince of Fire
6. The Messenger

In this book, Gabriel, a former assassin for Israel's foreign intelligence service, the Mossad (which translates into English as "The Institution") retired after the murders of his wife and son to lead a quiet life as an art restorer, one who fixes the wounded past. Gabriel's ex-boss, Ari Shamron, an Israeli spymaster a la George Smiley but more treacherous, convinces Gabriel to leave his sheltered hermitage to hunt down Tariq, the assassin who killed Gabriel's family, before he can kill again. In an exquisitely wrought plot of treachery and counter-treachery, Silva explores the Palestinian-Israeli conflict from many, many angles.

I don't read spy fiction as a genre. I don't read anything as a genre. I read great writers, pretty much no matter what they write. I've read a lot of John Le Carre, and one of the few criticisms that I have of his work is that his spies play a gentleman's game. However, Le Carre's spies are deeply human and British.

Silva's spies are not gentlemen, and this is no gentlemen's game. This is hard and dirty intelligence work by one of the hardest and dirtiest intelligence services on the planet. The Mossad is charged with keeping tiny Israel's formidable opponents at bay, and you don't do that by playing fair. Gabriel's Mossad plays entirely unfairly, as it must, as it does in real life. In this book, Jacqueline/Sarah is used as a "honey trap," and Silva lightly explores what it does to a woman to prostitute oneself for a good cause. Silva does exaggerate some of the Mossad's successes, which he does not need to do because the Mossad is very successful without Silva's burnishing.

Silva's plotting is as intricate as a chess game, albeit a game where each of the chess pieces has a deeply felt personality, background, and damaged psyche such that they refuse to move where the gamester wants them to and take on a life of their own. Another thing that I like about Silva's work is that, while Gabriel is the central character and our guide, each of Silva's characters has his/her own agenda and life and is capable of growing, changing direction, and surprising the reader. One feels when reading Silva's books that the book is built to elucidate several characters, not merely one central character.

TK Kenyon
Author of Rabid: A Novel and Callous: A Novel

46 of 48 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Silva proves he is still a pro..., May 28, 2001

By 

Christine "loves to read" (Setauket, NY, United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Kill Artist (Hardcover)

Gabriel Allon is "the Kill Artist"; a former assassin who worked clandestinely for the Israeli government. When we first meet him he is living in a remote English seaside village and working as an art restorer, a cover he used frequently during his covert operations. He is soon called out of retirement by his former boss, Ari Shamron, head of Israeli intelligence, and a calculating man with his own agenda...one that may cost Gabriel his life. Ari needs Gabriel's talents to track down Tariq, an Palestinian assassin whose killing rampage is threatening the Middle East peace negotiations. Tariq and Gabriel have met before when Gabriel killed Tariq's brother in a very brutal manner, and Tariq avenged that death with a killing of his own...Gabriel's wife and son, making this a story of international intrigue and personal revenge. The stage is now set for a major showdown, but they must first cover three continents and weave through an array of cultures and characters to find each other. Gabriel is assisted by his former intelligence co-worker, a beautiful French girl named Jacqueline, whose family was killed in the Holocaust. Jacqueline is hesitant to join Gabriel on this assignment, but in the end it is love that prevails, and she plunges head first into Tariq's lair, a deadly trap that Gabriel may not be able to get her out of in time to save her life.

What I love about Daniel Silva is his smooth and uncomplicated style. He has a "rhythm" to his writing that hooks you somewhere in the beginning and stays with you long after you finish the book. It took me a little longer to warm up to these characters, probably because there isn't a lot happening in the way of relationships as there is in his other book _The Mark Of The Assassin_. Everyone is hiding behind their own specific job and agenda. They're all business. Still, the plot is riveting and the pace is solid.

4 and 1/2 stars. Highly recommended. His protagonist doesn't quite involve the readers as in his past works but this is definitely worth a buy.

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A good start to a great series..., October 23, 2006

By 

Cynthia K. Robertson (beverly, new jersey USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Kill Artist (Mass Market Paperback)

The Kill Artist is the first book in Daniel Silva's Gabriel Allon series and is a good start to a great series!

The Kill Artist opens in Paris, where the Israeli ambassador to France is murdered by an Arab assassin. The crime has all the hallmarks of an operation by Tariq al-Hourani. Tariq's brother was part of the Black September Movement and was assassinated by the Israeli Secret Service (also called The Office). Once aligned with Yasir Arafat, Tariq broke with Arafat and the PLO when they entered into peace negotiations with Israel.

Ari Shamron, former head of The Office, seeks out the services of Garbriel Allon, an art restorer who has also served The Office as an assassin. Although reluctant to become involved, Allon has a personal grudge to settle as Tariq is responsible for the car bombing that killed Allon's toddler son and maimed his wife (physically and mentally). He agrees to again work for The Office, and his job is to find and murder Tariq. He has the assistance of a beautiful French model and sometimes Israeli operative, Jacqueline Delacroix. Allon uses Delacroix to infiltrate Tariq's inner circle so that he can discover his whereabouts. What Allon is not gambling on is that at the same time, Tariq is trying to find and kill Allon.

The Kill Artist is just a bit hokey in spots. To think that a world famous model could be used as an operative is a stretch. Allon also makes wrong assumptions that put him and others in danger. But I'm willing to overlook these flaws because Silva's writing is so good. Allon muses "As always, he was struck by the similarities between the craft of restoration and the craft of killing. The methodology was precisely the same: study the target, become like him, do the job, slip away without a trace."

Since I've already read the other Allon books, I'm now looking forward to Silva's latest release which I understand will be out in February 2007.