The Aiken Trilogy - prequel and sequels to The Spy Game
“It’s not how you play the GAME… It’s how the game plays YOU.”
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MUIR’S GAMBIT: A SPY GAME NOVEL – THE AIKEN TRILOGY BOOK 1
“Relentlessly tense… This smashing espionage tale kicks off what promises to be a smart, indelible series.” Kirkus Reviews
"Muir’s Gambit is a brilliant opening salvo in the author’s Aiken Trilogy. Espionage fans looking for an alternative to standardized spy-thriller tropes will find plenty to entertain them in this satisfyingly offbeat offering." BlueInk Reviews
Summary: Prequel to Beckner’s classic film Spy Game, Muir's Gambit opens with the assassination of CIA hero Charlie March. Mentor to Nathan Muir, March’s murder presents Langley the opportunity to rid themselves of Cold War dinosaur Muir. Muir's Gambit introduces hard-luck CIA lawyer Russell Aiken dispatched to force Muir’s confession. The protégé Muir cast aside for Tom Bishop, Aiken thirsts for payback. As the two spies play a cat-and-mouse interrogation, Muir's Gambit examines the lives of two men sanctioned to immorality who have one night to regain honor and reconcile themselves to the one moral spy, Bishop, who stands between them.
BISHOP’S ENDGAME: A SPY GAME NOVEL – THE AIKEN TRILOGY BOOK 2
"The mythology of Nathan Muir is nothing short of epic, and nothing he says or does should be ignored. Electric from the get-go, Beckner's sequel is a supercharged fireball, a raging inferno of action and thrill." - RECOMMENDED, The US Review of Books
"Tony Mendez and I have been fans of Michael Beckner’s work for years – The Agency, through Spy Game to his trilogy of Spy Game books: he captures the essence and intricacies of spies and the cat and mouse choreography of street-level espionage." Jonna Mendez, former CIA Chief of Disguise “
Summary: Sequel to Beckner’s classic Spy Game, it’s ten years since Nathan Muir rescued Tom Bishop from a Suzhou Prison and escaped Langley for good, now, all his former agents have suddenly vanished around the globe. Astonishingly, a message arrives from Malaysia: one spy survives. Long forgotten, he knows the secrets behind Muir’s networks and a new cataclysmic danger. Just one a catch. He’ll only come in to the man Langley trusts less and despises more than Muir: Tom Bishop. Once again it falls to hapless CIA lawyer Russell Aiken to run interference for the Agency… What could possibly go wrong?
AIKEN IN CHECK: A SPY GAME NOVEL – THE AIKEN TRILOGY BOOK 3
"Thoroughly mind-bending, time-twisting, betrayal-baiting… The rare [spy] novel that teaches as well as entertains… It invites readers to think about right and wrong, good and evil, loyalty and betrayal, and the real cost of a life lived in service to one’s country rather than one’s self." - US Review of Books
"Michael Frost Beckner is the rarest of spy novelists, a beautiful and compelling writer who also has a mastery of tradecraft and a deep understanding of how espionage really works." Joe Weisberg, former CIA Officer and Emmy winning creator of The Americans
Summary: Christmas Eve in Havana, and Aiken in Check finds ill-starred and afflicted Russell Aiken betraying America to save CIA officer Nina Estrada. But as Aiken’s treason exposes the CIA’s top spy in Castro’s regime, events in Cuba share a hidden connection to Bishop and Muir’s China past. Will Aiken lose all he loves, or will he assume Muir’s mantle to become grandmaster of the Spy Game? Bursting with Aiken's absurdist wit, Aiken in Check is a love-letter confession, wrapped in the hauntings of three men's past, inside a present Christmas deadly, over the quantum fate of Christmas's yet to come.
Author Biography: After a degree in Novel Writing from University of Southern California under PEN/Faulkner winner T.C. Boyle, Michael Frost Beckner began a Hollywood career as writing assistant to Academy Award winner Barry Levinson. With over three decades as a screen and television writer he’s written close to 100 original screenplays, adaptations, and teleplays in the employ of every major film studio, television network, and cable outlet. He is best known for his CBS series The Agency, his film Spy Game, and his Sniper franchise now in production on its 8th sequel. As a commentator on American espionage, Beckner has appeared on CNN, Fox News, CBS News, TF1 in France, and as a featured guest of Bill Maher on HBO.