The Hidden Assassins
Robert Wilson
Harcourt, Inc.
Reviewed by Kirsten Fournier
Inspector Javier Falcón is back in Robert Wilson’s The
Hidden Assassins, the third installment
in a series of four crime novels.
Following The Blind Man of Seville
and The Vanished Hands, Falcón finds
himself leading the criminal investigation of a lifetime after an
explosion
leaves a Seville apartment
block
and nearby pre-school in ruins. With the
Madrid 2004 bombings still fresh in everyone’s mind, the discovery of a
mosque
in one of the demolished apartment buildings incites panic in the city
of Seville
and a full-scale terrorist alert ensues.
Although an Islamic terrorist network called Mártires
Islámicos
para la Liberación de Andalucía claim responsibility for
the attack, Falcón
begins uncovering evidence that suggests otherwise.
In conjunction with Falcón’s police
investigation, various intelligence agencies are conducting their own
investigation and Falcón soon finds himself using family
connections in Morocco
to procure crucial information. As
Falcón’s
police investigation continues there still remains the unsolved mystery
of an
unidentified, mutilated body found in a dumpster preceding the bombing
on the
morning of June 6, 2006. Wilson’s
masterful storytelling weaves these apparently separate story lines
together as
the horrifying truth bubbles to the surface.
Throughout the story, various sub-plots reveal characters
that have played key roles in Falcón’s life at one time or
another. Wilson skillfully uses these
sub-plots to
address other morally reprehensible acts such as domestic violence as
in the
case of Falcón’s ex-wife Inés and her current husband the
Judge Esteban Calderón;
adultery as in the case of Calderón’s extramarital affairs; and
the
exploitation of victims for political and financial gain as in the case
of
Fernando Alanis and his daughter. Falcón’s
love interest Consuelo’s emotionally charged therapy sessions with the
blind
psychologist, Alicia Aguado, seem somewhat extraneous to the storyline,
but by
including these details Wilson leaves the door wide open for
Falcón and
Consuelo’s relationship to develop in the next installment of this
crime series
quartet.
Dialogue is somewhat crude in parts of the novel,
particularly the interaction between Inés and Calderón’s
lover Marisa. Yet there are other parts
where the dialogue
is quite cerebral, such as Falcón’s conversations with the
American CIA
operative Mark Flowers, as well as his conversations with friend and
informant
Yacoub Diouri while in Morocco. Despite a somewhat flat narrative at times, Wilson
gives us crime fiction at its best. The Hidden Assassins effectively
showcases Wilson’s ability
to
interlace crime procedural with current events and the human condition
to
produce an international thriller reminiscent of modern day headlines.