Pay Any Price

Ted Allbeury is easily the best kept secret in espionage fiction. A former officer in the British Intelligence Corps who worked in counterintelligence, he brings hands on experience into all of his novels. And this one is an absolute delight! There is no real hero per se. Instead we are exposed to a couple of CIA hypnosis experts, Symons and Peterson, both of whom have more involvment than we care to know about in the two Kennedy assasinations, and a British operative named Boyd who is on assignment to the CIA. Boyd actually comes across their dirty dealings when the two experts, who are stashed away in a safe house in northern Britain, use hypnosis on a British soldier and a female civilian, who is a former exotic dancer now turned talent agency director. Both of these unknowing victims are used as assasins for the Brits in Northern Ireland. They are each hypnotized with multiple personalities and commit these deeds without their "normal" selves even being aware. The only negative I came away with was, as the reader, we don't get to witness the actual sanctions on the Northern Ireland victims. But Allbeury keeps the action moving at such a fast pace, we hardly notice.Also, he gives us insight into the kinds of people who would be involved in these types of sanctions and the rationale that they use to wipe away any guilt. His dialogue is biting. For example, one character puts it in perespective by saying "I don't mean 'playing God' - any totalitarian dictator can do that. Being God is different." Finally, leave it to Allbeury to give us that little twist of irony with regard to things to come. When talking about the Kennedys, one character says that they played the role of "the guys in the white hats" and really belonged in Hollywood. He then says, "One of these days, the country will do it in reverse. They'll go straight to Hollywood and pick a guy who plays the right kind of parts and make him president." As they used to say on "The A Team", don't you love when a plan comes together? And Allbeury's does, very well indeed.