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The Friend

A Novel

ebook
1 of 1 copy available
1 of 1 copy available

Joakim Zander delivers another "compelling, timely, and character-centered thriller" (Booklist) in this riveting story of international espionage.

November 2015. Jacob Seger arrives in Lebanon eager to make the most of his internship at the Swedish embassy in Beirut. But when he meets the handsome and mysterious Yassim at a glamorous party his first night in the city, he is swept up into a passionate, obsessive affair that renders everything else in his life insignificant. When terrorist claims against Yassim are brought to light, Jacob must confront his role in a complicated game he is wholly unprepared to play. Unsure who to believe or trust, he knows only that he must flee Beirut—and fast.  

Meanwhile in Sweden Klara Walldeen returns to the Stockholm archipelago to bury her beloved grandfather, her best friend Gabriella by her side. What should be a trip of mourning and solitude quickly turns perilous, however, when Gabi is arrested under suspicion of terrorist activity. After finding notes in Gabi’s purse about a clandestine meeting with a young Swedish diplomat, Klara springs into action, determined to clear her friend’s name.

Following Gabi’s trail, Klara comes face-to-face with Jacob, as well as with George Loow, a suave lobbyist from her past to whom she finds herself inexorably drawn. Now Klara, George, and Jacob set off on a race across Europe to stop a pending terrorist attack—and get to the bottom of Yassim’s true identity.

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    • Publisher's Weekly

      Starred review from April 29, 2019
      At the start of Zander’s thought-provoking standalone sequel to The Swimmer and The Believer, aspiring diplomat Jakob Seger, an intern assigned to the Swedish embassy in Beirut, arrives in Lebanon in August 2015, several months before the nightmarish ISIS attacks in France. At a party, Jakob encounters the alluring Yassim, who says he’s a war photographer. The two begin a passionate affair that becomes all-consuming for Jakob. Three months later in Sweden, recovering alcoholic Klara Waldéen, a former European Parliament political adviser scarred from events in the earlier novels, attends her beloved grandfather’s funeral, where she reunites with her close friend Gabriella, an attorney who has exposed a Russian role in recent Stockholm riots. Eventually, the two narratives—Jakob’s fraught relationship with Yassim, who may be a terrorist, and Klara’s struggle to pull her life together—intersect on a flight across Europe with devastating results. Thriller fans who enjoy flawed, achingly human characters won’t be able to put this one down. Agent: Astri von Arbin Ahlander, Ahlander Agency (Sweden).

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  • English

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