The Haze

Set in 2013, Hawkes’s engrossing debut introduces CIA agent Hector Kane, who, years after being fired without explanation, is welcomed back to the agency. Hector’s boss, George Moore (nicknamed the Cardinal because he “spent a year as a Jesuit monk novice before Langley entered his life”), who has managed to get the Senate to confirm him as the CIA director despite being considered the mastermind behind the intel that Iraq had WMDs, has a mission for Hector that involves the future of Egypt. Fifi Noman, the niece of the dean of the university where Hector was teaching between CIA stints, is the daughter of Ibrahim Noman, known as the Godfather of Egypt’s 2011 revolution. The Cardinal’s plan is for Hector to accompany Fifi and some others to the Southeast Asian country of Pulau, “a benevolent dictatorship,” expose Fifi to its underbelly, and “impress upon her pliant head the Kantian tenet that democracy was a categorical imperative.” Hawkes keeps the twists coming as Hector seeks to influence Fifi to promote the cause of democracy in Egypt. Fans of superior post–Cold War spy fiction will be satisfied. (Self-published)