The Nature of the Game

An ex-CIA operative is on the run from his former employers in this “brutal, moving” thriller from the author of Six Days of the Condor (James Ellroy). Jud is not too drunk to recognize the assassin. How the hit man found him in this hard-bitten roadhouse, Jud isn’t sure, but he’s not going down without a fight. His hands shaking too much for close combat, Jud perches himself on the bar’s roof and drops onto the assassin as he steps out into the darkness. Though Jud only meant to stun, the man is dead. Jud doesn’t care. Quitting the CIA hasn’t been easy. Once one of the agency’s top killers, Jud’s skills have been dulled by civilian life, and his only chance of survival is to go into hiding. But before disappearing completely, he calls one of the few people he can trust, DC journalist Nick Kelley. Together, they’re about to take on the deadly rot at the heart of the CIA. James Grady revolutionized the thriller genre with his CIA analyst codenamed Condor, immortalized by Robert Redford in Three Days of the Condor, and currently portrayed by Max Irons in the all-new TV series Condor. In The Nature of the Game, Grady introduces another complex hero in a “brooding, ambitious” thriller that offers a “wrap-up of everything awful in the spy business” (Kirkus Reviews).