Review of The Assassin’s Keeper by John McClements

Review of The Assassin’s Keeper
John McClements

Vince Flynn’s readers might like this story.
According to John McClements author’s page on Amazon, this book was partly based
on the author’s life. When McClements worked on a cruise ship, he met a woman
named Drinda who becomes a character in The Assassin’s Keeper. Drinda is accused
of murdering her boyfriend in the novel and helps to recruit John Scott ( the fictional
McClements). In real life McClements jumped ship in San Francisco to be with Drinda.
When Scott’s ship sails into San Francisco, he also jumps ship. Drinda introduces Scott,
a citizen of the UK, as is McClements,, to a sleeper cell assassin from Argentina named
Pedro who blackmails John and is planning to use him in the future. The Falklands war
is going on between the UK and Argentina at the time.
Pedro has left Argentina as a CIA-like agent in the beginning of the book under puzzling
circumstances. Is Pedro’s mission to protect or kill? Just as sleeper cells are loosely
organized, so too is The Assassin’s Keeper.  That’s OK(although some readers may
find fault with the confusing strands of the book’s plot) since sleeper cell assassins are
not given defined missions until the last minute. Pedro blends into the USA community
through legitimate employment (ironically he becomes a contractor to the CIA) like all
sleeper cell members. His mission is full of twists and turns. It is 1982 when Pedro’s
mission takes him to Greece. It is there that his mission ends and John Scott is left to
wonder what comes next.

William Snyder
3 Stars