Review: NEED TO KNOW, Karen Cleveland

• This edition published by Penguin Random House UK 2018
• source: my local library
• ISBN 978-0-5930-7960-7
• 292 pages
• Read an extract

Synopsis (publisher)

Perfect husband. Perfect father. Perfect liar?

Do you really know who you kissed goodbye this morning?

You get to work. Make a coffee. Turn on your computer.

Your task: break into a Russian criminal's laptop and find proof that he's concealing five deep-cover agents - seemingly normal people living in plain sight.

You’re in. Five faces stare back at you.

One of them is your husband.

From Amazon:
Vivian Miller. High-powered CIA analyst, happily married to a man she adores, mother of four beautiful children. Until the moment she makes a shocking discovery that makes her question everything she believes.
She thought she knew her husband inside and out. But now she wonders if it was all a lie. How far will she go to learn the truth?  And does she really . . .

My Take

This story was a real page-turner.

Vivian Miller is a CIA analyst who discovers that, for the last 10 years, her husband has been lying to her. She knows what she should do, but if she does, then he, or she, face years of imprisonment. The longer she delays, the deeper the quandary, and the worse the consequences for her family. And does the infiltration of US intelligence go much much deeper than anyone likes to admit?

Very engrossing read, perhaps not totally credible, but then the author has herself been a CIA analyst.

My rating: 4.5

About the author

Karen Cleveland spent eight years as a CIA analyst, focusing on counter-terrorism and working briefly on rotation to the FBI. She has master's degrees from Trinity College Dublin and Harvard University. She lives in northern Virginia with her husband and two young sons.