The Middleman: A Novel

I read and enjoyed the first ten novels of Mr. Steinhauer, but not this one. This is a complete departure from his Europian spy novels, this being set 98% in the US and dealing with (gasp!) corruption in the government. I was disappointed to see Mr. Steinhauer's political views not too subtlely revealed, but probably should have guessed his are leftist with no discernible proposed solutions. The plot is convoluted, the characters forgettable, stereotypical and too numerous, and the climax nonexistent. I saw who the culprits were in the first hint, but hoped he would tie the numerous and lengthy spaghetti strands of the story together in a climactic denouement. Instead, it ended up like a deflated disco ball at a beach party with strangers. Don't waste your time.

I have always loved this author's work - I've read all of his books - so of course when Amazon told me this was coming out I signed up it pre-publication. What a mistake. The plot makes little to no sense, the characters are just plain odd, the "leftists" have nothing to do with liberals or progressives and more to do with crazed right-wing militia leaders, their followers are abysmally stupid (that might make sense, actually) and the ending of the book was like an old lemon which had lost all of its juice and had nothing left to give. What a disaster. Sorry Oren! You were such a marvelous action and spy novelist - what happened? In any case, if you're considering buying this one, save your money and buy an earlier Steinhauer novel instead.

Steinhauer is a great writer - this tome flat out sucked. The book had potential but it gave, as expected, a 'get out of jail card' to the violent immoral and contemptuous left-Marxist-Leninist nihilists instead of exposing their self-pitying whining for the future they portend for all of us

It reminds one of a Robert Ludlum-Ken Follett-Michael Crichton novel i.e. you know the main protagonist has to survive whatever convoluted trap doors are front-loaded to the very end, and all the ‘stuff’ in between is 100% nonsense.
Sadly Stienhauer had a real chance to take a real novelist insight to the emerging pagan left that is fast metastasizing nationally and worldwide. Consider the illogicality of ‘transgenderism’ and if you did question such then await the ‘anger’ from those who hold to such idiocy. Or wonder why so many illegal aliens have flooded the USA since 1973 but never wonder what happened that year (Roe v. Wade). Or maybe ask yourself why it is, in 2018, that ‘global warming’ seems to matter to the ‘Bishop of Rome’ aka the Pope, more than the homosexual pervert priests preying on young seminarians and boys.
My point? This novel did ‘kind of’ look into the seismic concussions that ‘rent’ the establishment order in November 2016 with the election of Trump but sadly, as expected, turned the ‘misguided’ ‘me too’s’ into ‘troubled witches (Ingrid - truly a 1000% horrible human being) or skanky harpies (Rachel- I am woman hear me roar) instead of really asking “What has happened to American women in the past 40+ years to turn them into hardcore feminazis? The emasculation of the American males into castrated fops? All the men, save Kevin (naturally an African-American) were either - abusers, wife beaters or philanderers).

I made a mistake when I got The Middleman from NetGalley. I wasn’t paying attention, thought I hit the Read Now button for another book and ended up with this one instead. I do not like political/espionage thrillers. I have read them, even reviewed them, in the past. I can’t get into the books. So, I wasn’t very happy when I realized what I did. But, I decided to suck it up.

I couldn’t get into the book. I struggled to finish it. If I didn’t have a personal goal of not DNF’ing a book, then it would have been DNF’d and forgotten about. But, I stuck it out. It took me 4 nights to finish this book. 4 torturous nights of me falling asleep while reading. That is something I rarely do.

I did like the plot. It was something that I could see happening in real life. 400 young people disappearing all at once. All 400 have traces to a domestic terrorist group. Told from 4 different POV’s, this should have been a riveting book. Instead, I ended up getting bored with the book halfway through. If the author had stuck with one or two POV’s, then it would have worked. But with 4 different ones. Well, I had a hard time keeping track of everything. Even with the chapters marked.

I couldn’t connect with any of the characters. It drove me nuts because I need to have at least 1 connection in the book. I didn’t have any.

I did feel that the book did fit in with the mystery genre pretty well. The story with the 2nd in command of the terrorist group was well-played out. I didn’t see him being who he was until it was explained at the end. As for the thriller genre, not so much. I kept losing attention, which isn’t good in a thriller. You need to be sucked into a thriller book and then spit out at the end feeling. The Middleman didn’t do that. The same thing goes for suspense. The book should have been fast-paced right from the start. Instead, it started off slowly. It did pick up steam by the middle of the book, only to slow down by the end of the book. Very frustrating to read.

I do feel that there was a huge hole in the plotline in the middle of the book. Take for instance Rachel being in the hospital. I had to reread the chapters leading up to her being injured for any mention of her getting hurt. There was nothing. But suddenly, she was on medical leave from a bad injury. Made 100% no sense to me. There are a few more examples but I don’t want to make a novel out of my review.

There was also some lag in the plotline. One right around Rachel’s injury. The other was when Kevin was in Europe, chasing leads all over the place. The author recovered very well but still.

The end of The Middleman was confusing. Not in the sense how it ended. I agreed with the explanations that Rachel got about the case. It was the ending involving another key character. I kind of shook my head and wondered “Why was she there? How did she get there?” I was also left wondering if that group was going to be reborn. Something about what the men were talking about made me wonder that. There were also some unfinished storylines that made me go “Huh“. I hate it when storylines are left unfinished. I hate it even more when it was attached to a major storyline. No closure makes me cranky.

Why I rated The Middleman 2 stars. There were huge holes in the plotline mid-book. There were dropped storylines. There were too many POV’s. There were some things that I did like about The Middleman. I did like the plot. I felt that the mystery angle of the book was well written.

One of the minor characters in The Middleman is an author of spy fiction named David Parker who, in teaching an NYU class on History of the Espionage Novel, discusses what he considers to be "the two major strains of spy fiction--the fantastic (James Bond, Jason Bourne) and the realistic (George Smiley, Paul Christopher)." I mention this up front in my review because any would-be reader needs to know that this novel falls squarely in the realistic strain. So if you find le Carre too ponderous and slow-paced and are looking for an action-driven thriller, you're better off turning somewhere else for your summer entertainment. But if you're interested in a timely, politics-driven plot centered on a radical underground movement (the Massive Brigade) that rises up against our established political and business institutions, The Middle Man is worth considering.

The plot structure of this novel is somewhat unusual. It's broken into five parts, the first two of which read like political conspiracy novel that chronicles the rise and fall of Martin Bishop and the Massive Brigade, and the remaining three like a mystery in which FBI agent Rachel Proulx tries to unravel the complex maneuverings and motives that explain the Brigade's apparent undoing. This structure allows the author to inject espionage elements into the latter half of the story but makes the plot feel disjointed, a shortcoming that's exacerbated by using Massive Brigade member Kevin Moore as a primary narrator of the first section while suppressing his point of view in most of the second section. The ending of the story is also less tantalizing than it might have been, a problem I attribute in large part to the whodunit structure of the second half.

The structural unity issue aside, this novel features smart writing, a complex yet plausible plot, and a timely and engaging premise, which just might be enough to satisfy fans of realistic espionage fiction.

It was a breath of fresh air to have read this book as Steinhauer's two previous books were disappointments, especially "All the old Knives". This book equalled his intense, deep, complicated plots and intrigue that were beautifully evident in his "Tourist" Trilogy. I enjoy books that require focused reading due to different twisting plots yet all coming together as the books comes to a climax. Not to give away the surprising and satisfying ending, I hope the ending lead characters are brought back as compatriots in a sequel as this book was perfectly timed to today's disjointed political and social scene in our country. Bravo -- a great book and I hope Mr Steinhauer reads this review !!!

I have read all of Steinhauer’s books and always been well satisfied with his efforts. This book however, was a vast disappointment. It was by no means a page turner, rather it was a book I couldn’t wait to finish so I could move on to something better. The foray into a U.S. based/themed book on domestic terrorism was a weak effort. The plot was uninspiring, not very original, with characters that are easily forgettable. Read it if you must, but be forewarned this book does not measure up to his past efforts.

Martin Bishop is the leader of a social movement known as the Massive Brigade. The members of the brigade tend to be young, progressive and screaming for social change in America. The Federal Bureau of Investigation sees the group as a potential terrorist group and places Special Agent Rachel Proulx, who specializes in left-wing hate groups, in charge of an FBI working group monitoring the Brigade, after 400 members of the group disappear.

As Rachel searches for those that disappeared, realizing that the disappearance could lead to violence, violence certainly does occur and the hunt is intensified.

This reader enjoyed the previous 10 espionage novels of author Steinhauer, and his recently released “The Middle Man” is different from his previous work. The timeline is current, years 2017-2018 with tenseness straight off today’s streets. The reader can visualize Antifa, the left-wing anti-fascists wearing all black and covering their faces while they bring hatred and violence on to American streets.

The early chapters were difficult staying focused, perhaps because our news coverage is similar and disturbing or perhaps one does not want to see the story become reality. Still, as the story continued, what one thought was the primary story, it grew into more challenging phases, especially with the role of talented Rachel Proulx.

As one continues reading, the role of the FBI is conflicting and soon some things don’t add up. As Rachel begins investigating her own agency, we soon learn that the fictional FBI of the story, might not be all that dissimilar to the real Federal Bureau of Investigation.

While this reader enjoyed “The Middle Man” when the book was finished, he certainly hopes that author Steinhauer returns to his writing roots, which is espionage.

The heroine in Olen Steinhauer's "The Middleman," FBI Special Agent Rachel Proulx, is determined to learn the truth about an underground organization, the Massive Brigade, whose leader, Martin Bishop, convinces hundreds of men and women who are fed up with America's government to join his cause. The new members are instructed to throw away their cell phones, IDs, and credit cards, leave their families and jobs behind, and live communally in safe houses. What form their rebellion will ultimately take is unclear. Bishop's partner, Ben Mittag, is fiercer in his denunciation of the establishment, and advocates the use of force to change the status quo.

Rachel and a second FBI Agent, Kevin Moore, travel across the United States, and in Kevin's case, to Germany and England, searching for answers. Also caught up in the mayhem is a pregnant woman named Ingrid who, indignant about the shooting of unarmed black men by police officers, joins the Brigade. She does so in spite of the fact that she is an expectant mother with her baby's welfare to consider. After several acts of violence take the lives of innocent victims, Rachel and Kevin suspect that something more is going on behind the scenes. They join forces to conduct their own investigation.

Alas, this is not one of Steinhauer's best efforts. The plot is muddled, the outcome is blatantly foreshadowed, and the characters are, for the most part, one-dimensional—either altruistic and selfless or unscrupulous and conniving. In addition, the author incorporates themes that, although timely, are insufficiently developed to pack much of a wallop. "The Middleman" might have been a more satisfying work of fiction had the author toned down the rhetoric and crafted his narrative with more subtlety, realism, and coherence.

The Middleman, the latest novel by Steinhauer, is an intriguing political thriller that takes you into the heart of American politics and immerses you in a story of left-wing ideology and the struggle to maintain morality and induce change without force in a world motivated by violence.

The prose is descriptive and well paced. The characters are passionate, resourceful, and determined. And the plot is an engaging tale about greed, power, deception, abuse, violence, manipulation, murder, and corruption.

Overall, The Middleman is a dark, timely, pensive tale that explores the fine line between good and evil, and highlights just how easily that line can become blurry.