The Swede

Book excerpt: A Swedish security agent is summoned to interrogate a terror suspect held by the FBI in this sophisticated, fast-paced thriller—but the prisoner isn't the only one with something to hide. At a remote military base in the Indian Ocean, the FBI is trying to get a prisoner to confess. But the detainee, a suspect in an Islamist-inspired terror attack in the United States, refuses to talk. Ernst Grip, a Swedish security officer, has no idea why he's been dispatched to New York City. The FBI agent he meets on arrival, Shauna Friedman, seems to know a little too much about him. And when he arrives at his real destination, the American authorities have just one question: Is their terror suspect a Swedish citizen? In the process of uncovering the prisoner's true identity, Grip discovers the man's ties to a group of other suspects—a ruthless American arms dealer, a Czech hit man, a mysterious nurse from Kansas, and a heartbreakingly naive Pakistani. The closer Grip gets to the truth, the more complicated the deception becomes. Who is real and who is leading a double life? The Swede is a riveting, intense novel about the compromises that people—and nations—make in the name of security and survival. Within this world built on secrets, Grip and Friedman have to learn to trust each other if they hope to stay alive.