Book Review: Married to the Mossad by Shalva Hessel

Book Review: Married to the Mossad by Shalva Hessel

 

Spoiler alert - Although, I do not reveal secrets and actual spoilers; I do make a comment on how the story progressed which I personally feel is spoiler alert worthy enough.

 

The title was promising.

My first impression was that the tale would be about the wife of a spy and her struggles with life as she tries to make sense of her husband’s suspicious job and its requirements.

As the book progressed, I realized that this was true for only one chapter. In the very next chapter, the secret was revealed to the lady and she embraced it.

In fact, she, more than embraced it. She became a part of the job and voluntary inducted herself into her husband’s mission, helping him achieve his objective.

And that is when she comes across a person who had helped her once … and was now seemingly being duped by another person, who had duped someone the lady knew. She wants to warn him but can’t for fear of blowing up her cover.

Once her husband’s mission is completed, she takes it upon herself to investigate and find the truth of the matter and warn the benefactor about the cheat. 

The more she gets involved in the matter, more bizarre the story gets.

There books starts out with a promise of being a joyride but half way through we get the feeling of it being dragged mercilessly.

The story could have ended in many places and it could have been a good novella or even a novel; but the story went on and on, creating new twists and turns, surprising support and shocking betrayals.

In fact, half way through the book, you begin to question the title of the book. Except for a few mentions and some background material, the Mossad does not really play a role in the story.

The book is entirely about the female protagonist who has her own convictions and who stands by them. She is indeed a very strong character but her transgressions in the second half take some of the glory away. What she does is not surprising. It is probably what would have happened in real life too. But somehow it scraped and tarnished the towering image that was built for the protagonist through the story. It was almost anti-climactic. Also, it was in direct conflict with her own thinking, principles and view of the other person.

Overall, an interesting story but don’t go by the title. Mossad is not the key to the story. It is just in the background. Be ready for a story which involved a strong female protagonist who takes on some evil and strong thugs who won’t shy away from harming her for meddling in their affairs. It is also about her personal emotional conflict and choices.

Not much in cover design there. a few pics thrown in along with engagement rings and a gun. Gives it a spy-love-triangle feel where one guy is linked to 2 women - which is totally misleading. And it is totally untrue.

Rating: 3/5