The Patriot’s Daughter

CIA officer Ava Anderson tries to fend off Russian cyberattacks in this so-so spy thriller from Butler (The Syndicate Spy). Ava has been stationed at the U.S. embassy in Moscow with her former trainer, Ben Jennings, for six weeks, trying to recruit someone from the FSB to help her uncover the source of cyberattacks that are destabilizing the U.S. government. She’s also there on a personal mission to unravel the secrets of her mother, a CIA officer who was killed by her handler while she was stationed in Russia decades earlier. As she navigates pushback from tech CEO Nathaniel Grey, whose platform is notorious for spreading misinformation, and Russian oligarch Dmitri Abramovich, who’s trying to goad the U.S. into nuclear war, she carries a torch for Ben, who’s “six-foot-three and built like a Norse God,” and targets an older FSB agent for recruitment. Butler’s nine-year career as a CIA officer lends the proceedings authenticity, but the plot’s espionage elements mix uneasily with its romance tropes, resulting in a lumpy, unfocused narrative that fails to realize its full potential. Readers will be underwhelmed. Agent: Tia Ikemoto, CAA. (Apr.)