The Broker

“The Broker” is Joel Backman, once head of a prestigious law firm that specialized in high-powered lobbying of American lawmakers and politicians. His final deal involved peddling a software system designed by Pakistani hackers to neutralize the most sophisticated but secretly deployed satellite surveillance system to the highest bidder—the Chinese, Saudis, Israelis. After some money changed hands, he is arrested by US authorities on trumped-up charges. The people that paid transaction money for the software felt shortchanged, while those that built the satellite wanted him and the software at all cost. To avoid their wrath he pleads guilty to charges so he could be hidden away in prison for 14 years.

But only a few months down the line the CIA that is still puzzled about the secret satellite decides to get the out-going US President to pardon Backman conditionally. Their plan is to hide him in a foreign place and after a while leak his location to those that might want him dead so as to find out who would go after him, believing those people would have the highest interest in the satellite. Backman agrees to the deal though without knowing why he was being released. He is ferreted to a new home in Italy using two different names. In the course of his learning Italian, paid for by the CIA, we are treated to some Italian art and cuisine and history. He also falls in love with one of his tutors, a woman that later saves his life by giving him her dying husband’s passport and changing his looks to match the photo in it. Unknown to the CIA that are controlling his new life in Italy, he makes contact with his lawyer son in the US who secretly sends him a smartphone with which they communicate. He manages to escape death at the hands of the trained killer agents from China and Israel, goes back to the US without the knowledge of the CIA that had agents watching him, and eventually buys some safety for himself by releasing the powerful software to the US army. In exchange he’s provided two identities, two passports, and a promise to intervene with the foreign powers that had been after his life because of the software.

The story touches on how the CIA relates with the American president and their role in establishing or influencing American foreign policy. A new US president is shown asking the acting CIA director what step should be taken for the best American interest. Then there is the realization that your own American government could secretly want you dead, especially if its laws can’t get you. They can also hide you by giving you new identities, which means what some crooks do in selling stolen or forged passports and such is also done legally. The methods of grooming lethal agents to kill and speak many languages so as to be able to disguise as nationals of many nations comes to light in the character of the Chinese, Sammy Tin. How secret agents go about their job of trailing their targets, being able to shoot with skill, to kill and disappear without evidence is also shown. There is mention of how non-Americans are treated shabbily by immigration officials at airports. Kwytemail is introduced as a public but very secure email system, and Backman’s very hard to guess (and long) password could not be broken even by agents of the CIA when eventually his smartphone is discovered and covertly stolen by them. When his smartphone gets taken, Backman has to quickly learn to use a cyber-café to go online. And the Swiss as being bankers for the world’s illegally-acquired loot also come to play. In all, an interesting and exciting plot to read.

October 23, 2015. Novel first published in 2005 by Bantam Dell, ISBN 0-440-24158-8. Picture source: Google Images.