Book review: Red Sparrow by Jason Matthews

I think a change of pace is in order after the gloom and doom content of my last book review concerning a possible cyber attack against the continental United States’ electrical grids.

While I do not think you will need to check with your doctor as to whether or not your heart is healthy enough to read this book, I want to give you a heads up that there is a lot of sex in this book.

Just in case you are now wondering, the book I have chosen for this review is a spy novel written in 2013 by Jason Matthews titled Red Sparrow. It is available in soft cover (547 pages) and electronically.

The author was a CIA field operative for 33 years before retiring, and he appears to be using much of his CIA experiences as material for this book.

The book’s title refers to a special secret Russian training school for smart, young and attractive Russian women. They are taught the art of seduction and how to use sex and blackmail to obtain highly classified information from foreign diplomats and military personnel. According to the author, this school is called “Sparrow School,” and it is considered a Russian intelligence academy or AVR.

The author also makes a brief reference to an equivalent school for smart, young and attractive Russian men called “Raven School,” where young men are trained to use their charm and talents to seduce neglected or unappreciated diplomats’ wives and secretaries (both male and female) to obtain classified information.

The main characters in the book are Nathan (Nate) Nash, a young CIA field operative, and Dominika Egorova, a former Russian ballerina training to become an agent of the SVR (the successor of the KGB).

Nate has been handling a high-ranking Russian general, who has been a U.S. spy in the Kremlin for the past 14 years. This general was considered to be Nate’s asset, and his code name was “Marble.”

Dominika’s test or initiation for Sparrow School was seducing a wealthy protagonist of President Putin. However, unbeknown to Dominika, this man was to be garroted while having sex with her.

Upon completing Sparrow School, Dominika’s first assignment is to become very close to and intimate with Nate in an effort to entice him into divulging the identity of Marble.

To add a little complication to the story, the CIA wants Nate to use his charms, etc. to recruit Dominika into becoming a CIA spy to replace Marble in case he gets caught or decides to retire.

The book moves its characters into and around various locations, including Moscow, Helsinki, Athens, Rome, New York and Washington.

Also, President Putin makes several appearances in the book, one in which he is, of course, shirtless.

21st Century spying is portrayed in the book as countries honoring, for the most part, an unwritten agreement that one country will no longer kill or torture another country’s apprehended spies in order for its apprehended spies not to be killed or tortured by that other country.

Thus, if one of two spying country’s agent or spy is arrested, he/she will either be deported immediately, or, depending upon his/her rank and value, detained for use as a later bargaining chip to exchange for someone being held by the other country. I think an early example of this procedure was portrayed in the 2015 movie “A Bridge Of Spies” involving the exchange of Russian spy Rudolf Abel for U-2 pilot Francis Gary Powers in the 1960s.

There is supposed CIA slang used by the author in this book, such as Feebs for the FBI, an L-Pill for a hidden poison needle in a ballpoint pen, Dead Drop, Running a Canary Trap, a Trap Door Team, and a Reverse Fish Hook Pattern, to name a few. There was even an older civilian couple known as “Archie and Veronica” used very inconspicuously to make sure Nate was not followed to several of his meetings with Marble or Dominika.

I found it rather interesting in this book that, in each of its chapters, when there was a meeting or negotiation over a meal or drinks, the recipe for the particular food being eaten or the drink imbibed was given at the end of the chapter.

Finally, there is a procedure detailed in the book for making a spy exchange on a bridge over a river between Russia and Estonia. This description went into the protocol of how to walk across the bridge and pass the person for whom you are being exchanged. 