{"id":3003,"date":"2025-03-24T22:08:57","date_gmt":"2025-03-24T21:08:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/minimal-kritikak.hu\/en\/?p=3003"},"modified":"2025-03-24T22:08:57","modified_gmt":"2025-03-24T21:08:57","slug":"the-night-agent-by-matthew-quirk-book-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/minimal-kritikak.hu\/en\/2025\/03\/24\/the-night-agent-by-matthew-quirk-book-review\/","title":{"rendered":"The Night Agent by Matthew Quirk \u2013 Book Review"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\"The<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

At the White House, a secret phone line can ring at any moment. FBI agent Peter Sutherland, sidelined to the fringes, has spent the past year working the night shift, waiting for a call that may never come. His only task: to answer and pass it along to the right people. When the phone finally rings, and a young woman in mortal danger begs for help, Peter follows his conscience. And just like that, he finds himself caught in a life-threatening conspiracy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Night Agent<\/em> is Impossible to Put Down<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s rare to come across a book that pulls you in with such ferocity as Matthew Quirk\u2019s spy thriller\u2014at least for the first 80 pages. Quirk sets the stage with an immediate sense of tension, relentless action, and a merciless antagonist, making the pages fly by.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Action, life-or-death stakes, a covert power play inside the White House. Spies operating under the radar. And to top it all off, the Russian GRU makes an appearance\u2014an agency that, compared to them, even the FSB (the successor of the old KGB) seems like a bunch of Girl Scouts. At least, according to Matthew Quirk. And once the GRU shows up, they waste no time hunting down anyone who gets too close to the fire.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s about the first 80-100 pages of The Night Agent<\/em>. If you don\u2019t want to be disappointed, stop reading right there!<\/span><\/strong> And that applies to both the book and this review.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Because right around this point, it becomes clear who\u2019s pulling the strings\u2014and with the complete annihilation of the mystery factor, the story becomes half as interesting. No, scratch that\u2014only a quarter as interesting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Night Agent<\/em> is Just Another Generic Thriller<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s start with the most important thing: Shoot first, ask questions later<\/em> is not exactly a winning strategy\u2014especially if you\u2019re trying to extract crucial information from people.<\/strong> But that\u2019s precisely the approach taken by the Russian intelligence agents, led by the feared Dmitri Sokolov.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

First, they mow down everyone who possesses the information they\u2019re after. Then, they start tracking down the victims\u2019 relatives, friends, and business associates, hoping that maybe someone else was told the crucial secret before they turned the original sources into Swiss cheese. I\u2019m no intelligence expert, but that doesn\u2019t exactly sound like an efficient method!<\/strong> And when it happens for the second or third time, it\u2019s even less convincing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But of course, if they didn\u2019t do it this way and instead used old-school methods\u2014like trying to extract the info with pliers or by using a brick (see: Robert Dugoni\u2019s The Last Agent<\/a>)\u2014then there wouldn\u2019t be much of a story left in The Night Agent<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What Is This Guy Even Doing in the FBI?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Peter Sutherland, the protagonist of The Night Agent<\/em>, is your classic good guy\u2122. Also, he has a chronic need to prove himself and a full-blown savior complex. Honestly, he should\u2019ve been weeded out during psychological screening.<\/strong> But of course, we know this all stems from his father, whose past with both the FBI and the U.S. government is\u2026 problematic, to say the least.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Still, signing up for the FBI knowing the highest position you\u2019ll ever reach is \u2018night-shift phone operator\u2019 in some backwater field office in South Dakota? Career suicide. (Okay, technically Peter takes calls that never come in at the White House instead of South Dakota\u2014but that\u2019s pretty much just as miserable. )<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And let\u2019s be real\u2014good guys are boring. Period.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Night Agent<\/em> is Slightly Ridiculous<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s never a good sign when an action-packed thriller could be staged as a play with a cast of just 5 or 6 people. That kind of minimalism screams cheap.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In The Night Agent<\/em>, it\u2019s painfully obvious that every character who appears will inevitably show up again. Often in the most ridiculous ways, resulting in plot twists that reach \u201cjumping the shark\u201d levels\u2014like the uncle\u2019s storyline, which is made even worse by its over-the-top sentimentality.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Matthew Quirk clearly used a brochure designed for elementary school students to get an overview of the U.S. political system while writing The Night Agent<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

An Absurd Conspiracy<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

If it hadn\u2019t been the case, then the grand conspiracy in his book wouldn\u2019t come across as utterly unrealistic nonsense.<\/strong> Furthermore, what Quirk claims about the presidential system\u2014that the American president is just a powerless puppet\u2014has recently been forcefully refuted by the Trump Tornado (which will likely end up sweeping itself away).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The fact that getting too close to Russia\u2019s embrace is deadly is something that everyone in the upper echelons of American politics already knows. If they don\u2019t\u2014no matter how high up they are\u2014they\u2019ll eventually meet the same fate as the conspirators in this book.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, the idea that the search for the traitors nesting in the West Wing of the White House has to be outsourced to some retirees instead of being handled by the FBI, the NSA, and who knows how many other intelligence agencies is truly mind-boggling stupidity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But of course, it\u2019s also telling that in the afterword of the book that inspired the ultra-successful Netflix series, Matthew Quirk thanks a bunch of second-rate and\/or mediocre thriller writers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Night Agent<\/em> is like Six Days of the Condor<\/em>\u2019s slightly dim-witted nephew. It starts off at breakneck speed, pulling you in with a thrilling setup\u2014only to slam headfirst into the White House fence… and knock itself out cold.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rating: 6.9\/10<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The Night Agent<\/em> by Matthew Quirk
512 pages, Mass Market Paperback
Published in 2019 by William Morrow Paperbacks<\/a>
—
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Argylle<\/em> by Elly Conway<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

At the White House, a secret phone line can ring at any moment. FBI agent Peter Sutherland, sidelined to the fringes, has spent the past year working the night shift, waiting for a call that may never come. His only task: to answer and pass it along to the right people. When the phone finally … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[9,120,113,277,199,247,23,39,276],"class_list":["post-3003","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-book","tag-action","tag-conspiracy","tag-fbi","tag-page-turner","tag-political-intrigue","tag-russia","tag-spy-novel","tag-thriller","tag-white-house"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Night Agent by Matthew Quirk \u2013 Book Review - minimal-Critiques<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The Night Agent is just waiting for your call. 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