A Very Private Plot: A Blackford Oakes Novel

While not the best Blackford Oakes novel, it's readable with a moderate amount of suspense -- not necessarily about what will happen (real-life history already contraindicates the potential of the main plot line about Gorbachev), but about why it didn't happen. A nice touch is the decade-wide dual story line with Oakes being called to testify in 1995 about the events of 1986. Characterization in the Soviet story line is a tad light; too many of the characters in the 1986 thread appear interchangeable. But it's a pleasant, fast read in the series.

This is probably the best of the Blackford Oakes books and, as another reviewer noted, it's a fitting and excellent finale to a worthy series of spy thrillers involving a credible and well-crafted protagonist. This book revolves around a plot to kill Mikhail Gorbachev when he was the leader of the Soviet Union. Buckley gives us a realistic view of life in Moscow under glasnost. Usually the Oakes books tend to be tempered in their pacing -- as you would expect from Buckley -- but this one has the burner turned up a little higher. Good suspense, good characters, good plot.

A worthy finish to the series - makes you sad there won't be more Oakes books. The real events following the completion of the book (late 1993) don't really alter how Buckley painted 1994 and 1995. A great read.