venetian judgement

This the last book I read in Italy, and I finished it when I got home. I bought this in the same store in Italy, which seemed to have British imports, but who knows, maybe they're American. The cover on the last one I read didn't seem to match the cover shown on my local (American) book buying sites.*

The Venetian Judgement is also a spy novel which takes places partially in Italy. Venice as you can imagine from the title. This one is written by David Stone, a pen name in the author blurb it actually says 'cover name' for a very mysterious type of guy who has lived in "North America, South America and Southeast Asia". Yeah. Very mysterious. I guess I hope he doesn't get killed for writing this novel?

Anyways, this writer, whatever his or her name is, but lets call him David Stone, DOES seem to know his stuff. The military and intelligence backgrounds (also eluded to in the blurb) seems to show in the writing. The Venetian Judgement centers around a character named Micah Dalton, sometimes know as the Crocodile. Stone has 4 novels out, each featuring Dalton. I think this is the third one so Dalton has some history, which is eluded to in this story. In this story, Dalton is introduced as a CIA 'cleaner' which I take to mean, a guy who comes in after the nasty bits are done by others, to clean up, but it may be that he doesn't just take out the trash, he may have a hand in its production. I guess I need to read more spy novels Stone's grasp of the lingo certainly seems solid, but it did leave me wondering in a few places.

I was again pleased with the Italian connection and delighted to have found a very entertaining read for the end of my vacation and the flight home. I'll also keep my eyes open for any more David Stone novel I happen to see.

* Yeah, the cover on Amazon doesn't match the cover of the book I bought in this case either.