The Blue Widows (Ben Kamal and Danielle Barnea Series #6)

Publishers Weekly

Like its predecessors, this sixth entry in Land's thriller series (Blood Diamonds, etc.) featuring Palestinian-American detective Ben Kamal is action-packed, if not always plausible. Kamal teams up with his on-again, off-again lover, Danielle Barnea, the head of Israel's National Police, to stop a post-September 11 terrorist plot. A group of terrorists infiltrates the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases in Maryland and makes off with the entire supply of smallpox virus-enough to destroy the U.S. population. Unaware of this, Ben, now working for a Boston private security firm, is hired by the State Department to investigate his brother Sayeed's involvement with a young Palestinian student known to have al-Qaida connections. Meanwhile, on the other side of the globe, Danielle raids the Gaza compound of Palestinian terrorists and finds that someone has beaten her to the punch: Hamas leader Akram Khalil and his guards lie dead, near a pile of charred papers. Finding a scorched fragment written in Arabic, she faxes it to Ben asking him for a translation. They discover that the fragment is a religious edict granting permission to bring about the fulfilling of the apocalyptic biblical prophecy, "the end of all things." The trail leads Ben and Danielle to Islamic zealot Layla Aziz Rahani, the eldest daughter of a powerful Saudi Arabian industrialist who has sworn vengeance on the U.S. The main story lines, some of them straining credibility, spin off into a multiplicity of minor subplots. Forgive the digressions and plot contrivances, and this is a fun read. (Mar.) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

Sixth in the hauntingly irresolvable Arab/Israeli thriller series featuring Palestinian-American Police Inspector Ben Kamal and his beloved Israeli Chief Inspector Danielle Barnea, who in novel after novel meet and part, meet and part, with Danielle having a miscarriage (sired not by Ben), then a fatally flawed fetus sired by Ben, and then turning from Ben with the unbearable foresight that a child by her and Ben would be crushed by religious conflict. In the last installment, Blood Diamonds (2002), Danielle and Ben looked lastingly parted when she was charged with killing her superior officer and jailed in Jerusalem. But off they went to fight the Dragon Lady and her fearful Black Death. Now Danielle has been promoted to head the National Police while Ben is tied to a security firm out of Boston-he feels more American these days. As if the Black Death, which might have wiped out half of mankind, weren't enough, the lovers now face a fatwa lifted from a charred manuscript that prophesizes The End of All Things. And replacing the Dragon Lady is Saudi Arabian billionairess Layla Aziz Rahani, whose exuberantly horrible pharmaceutical plot against Americans falls short of imploding the Solar System but-for victims-not greatly. No rest for the conflicted. Agent: Toni Mendez