It’s been a while since I’ve sat down to enjoy a Joel Rosenberg thriller. Like all super-fans, I started early with his Last Jihad series, five fantastic books mixing action, archaeology, politics, biblical prophecy, and the End Times. I picked up from there on the David Shirazi Books (a.k.a. The Twelfth Imam series) which focus most emphatically on radical Islamic terrorism.

I somehow missed the J.B. Collins Books—I think this was due to the fact that I only owned 2 of them at the time, so didn’t want to start and not be able to finish. It’s a lame excuse, but I’m sticking to it. I own them all now, so whenever I finish the Marcus Ryker Books, I’ll circle back.

The Kremlin Conspiracy is the first book in the Marcus Ryker series, so it inevitably contains a great deal of backstory which the others (I’m sure) won’t require. Key characters in this book include Marcus Ryker, a former Secret Service agent turned unofficial American spy, and Oleg Kraskin, son-in-law and trusted secretary to the unhinged Russian President, Aleksandr Ivanovich Luganov.

While I found this book as action-packed and exciting as Rosenberg’s previous books, it lacked the suspense that I’d hope to get from a real thriller—which brings me to a hang-up that I’ve gotta share. This is a publisher’s problem, no doubt, and not Rosenberg’s, but I absolutely can’t stand the spoiler-filled dust-jacked synopsis!

The key plot-point of this this entire book is (no spoilers here, since once glance at the book will tell you) an assassination plot against the Russian President. Here’s the rub: the characters in the book don’t even imply this possibility until like 80% into the book! That’s a climax that a reader wants to be led up to, not anticipate from before he even starts reading the book.

I didn’t want to doubt Oleg’s loyalties before I even met him, but I did. I didn’t want to be aware of how the Americans would hope to deal with a Putin-like madman in the Kremlin, but I was. This book was sapped of its suspense, thanks to the publishers. It’s like the 5-minute movie trailers you see in the theaters—rather than leaving you with great anticipation for the coming blockbuster, they show you the movie’s funniest or most exciting points, so you really don’t need to see the full thing at all. I hate it!

With that crap out of the way, I felt this book was yet another timely geopolitical thriller from a man who’s absolutely gifted in anticipating tomorrow’s headlines. He’s got a Putin-like Russian President bent on expansion and war and an untested Trump-like President in the White House facing a standoff over Ukraine and NATO allies in the Baltics. While Rosenberg implies nuclear destruction which hasn’t yet happened, such Russia expansion occurred within 3 years of this publication in the form of the Invasion of and War in Ukraine.

How does he do it? Beyond interviewing the right world leaders at the right time as a full-time journalist, Rosenberg also reads between the lines of what the world leaders officially say and do and anticipates actions that often take many others by surprise. For this reason, I strongly hope that he writes a new series about Taiwan and Chinese expansion!

I’m looking forward to picking up Book #2 in this series, The Persian Gamble. For those interested in tracking Rosenberg in his day job, be sure to check out allisrael.com, his website dedicated to “All Israel News.” There’s no better way to keep up to date on the goings on the Middle East.

©2022 E.T.

Read More from Joel Rosenberg:

• The Last Jihad:
  The Last Jihad (2002)
  The Last Days (2003)
  The Ezekiel Option (2006)
  The Copper Scroll (2006)
  Dead Heat (2008)
• Nonfiction:
  Inside the Revolution (2009)
• David Shirazi: 
  The Twelfth Imam (2010)
  The Tehran Initiative (2011)
  Damascus Countdown (2013)
• Non Series:
  The Auschwitz Escape (2014)
• Marcus Ryker: 
  The Kremlin Conspiracy (2018)
  The Persian Gamble (2019)