Traitors is an undeniable summer blockbuster fueled by cinematic action sequences of the highest caliber and a badass female protagonist making her debut in stunningly brutal fashion.
Alex Shaw is no stranger to writing gripping action-packed thrillers but Traitors may very well be his best work yet. A highly skilled assassin in a black ops French unit known as The Department, Sophie Racine receives a dossier to hunt down and assassinate a former French Legion who turned out to be a Russian sleeper agent. Racine enthusiastically undertakes the mission, driven by a scalding rage for her target with whom she has a personal score to settle. From the first page itself, Racine establishes herself as a bona fide expert in combat with pulse-pounding shootouts and hand-to-hand combat sequences that feel ripe for a big screen adaptation. As Racine races from France to a full-blown warzone in Ukraine where the Russian sleeper agent was located, she cannot help but wonder whether she is the hunter or the hunted as her foreboding sixth sense warns her of the dangers to come.
From the moment she lands in Ukraine, she gets to work racking up her kill count relentlessly. Keeping that in mind, Alex Shaw does not portray Racine as indestructible. She bleeds and tires just as any operative would but her specialist skills, emotional strength, and tenacity differentiate her from the enemy combatants as she shoots first and true without succumbing to fear and chaos around her. The flashbacks served an essential role to help readers understand her hardened exterior that holds in a barrage of angry and bitter emotions waiting to overtake her. Alex Shaw nails the delicate art of writing a strong and bold female protagonist without sexualizing her to the point where her looks seem more essential than her skills in the field.
On her mission, she comes across Aiden Snow, an ex-SAS operative who Alex Shaw’s fans will know very well. His directive is to rescue a British student who was abducted in a hate crime based on his ethnicity as a Pakistani. As their paths intertwine, Racine and Snow make an excellent duo with the right chemistry that is not rushed in a setting where the bullets flying around them are more pressing matters. Snow adds to the magnificent shootouts with his technical prowess with all sorts of weapons. And together they wreak havoc on the bad guys in the most enjoyable way.
Traitors is an absolute must-read powerhouse smash-hit and one of 2021’s very best. You simply cannot afford to sit this one out. The shocking twists-filled ending will have you desperate for the next Sophie Racine thriller!
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