Outbreak - Frank Gardner

 Frank Gardner writes top quality spy fiction.  Of course, he has the advantage of twenty years as the BBC's security correspondence, and we all know how he was shot and left in a wheelchair by terrorists in Saudi.   He knows how these things work.   Unlike most novelists, he knows how it feels to be shot.   All of these advantages are deployed in Outbreak, his third Luke Carlton thriller.

It's 2021, in the immediate aftermath of the Covid pandemic.   In Norway British researchers have to seek shelter from the storm and stumble upon a man with a terrible disease.   One scientist realizes she must be infected and stays with the dying man.   One of her colleagues tries to stay outside, the other runs for it.   Luke's first task is to oversee the extraction and track down the runaway.

In fact, all three have been infected.   The scientist who tried to stay outside initially checks clear and is repatriated, thus bringing the contagion into the UK.   It is fatal, incurable, and has been genetically engineered.   The obvious suspects are the Russians - the shed in which the first victim was found is near a Russian mining colony.   There are the usual stiff diplomatic exchanges - this is, after all, in the immediate aftermath of the Salisbury poisonings.   Some of the chemicals involved trace to a factory in Lithuania.   Luke is sent in with expert Jenny Li.

The people at the factory are definitely involved - but maybe the Russians aren't.   They offer to work with SIS.   General Petrov is tasked with finding out who leaked the tech required.   Luke and Jenny are invited to assist and observe.   Meanwhile, in England, people are definitely preparing some sort of bio attack.   Meanwhile, problems loom in Luke's private life.   His girlfriend Elise is pregnant but a little calendar work proves that Luke cannot be the father,

This is a good twist, the sort of twist that I wanted when I read the first Luke Carlton thriller, Crisis, back in 2017.   It's reviewed on this blog.   I enjoyed it but found a few minor faults.   Insufficient in-depth characterisation was one of them.  Gardner has come on since then.   I found no faults in Outbreak.   It's a first class thriller and highly recommended.