It’s unusual to start a book review with direct quotes from the author. However, in the case of Daniel Silva’s 21st novel featuring legendary spy and art restorer Gabriel Allon, I’m making an exception.

THE CELLIST is set largely during the autumn of 2020, with the climax taking place on Inauguration Day. However, Silva happened to be in the nation’s capital on business on January 6, 2021. Watching television that morning, he sensed that turmoil could arise after Donald Trump’s speech on the Ellipse. He states during an interview with his publisher, HarperCollins, “Nothing could have prepared me for the sight of his supporters rampaging through the halls of Congress…breaking windows, stealing documents and computers, defacing art, searching for lawmakers to kidnap or kill.”

"Akin to a diabolical game of chess, THE CELLIST is a sophisticated voyage through the world of concert halls, art museums, lavish receptions and the occasional chase scene --- all delivered with Silva’s crafty dry wit and innuendo."

Silva continues: “I jettisoned my planned ending, threw out several hundred pages of material, and rewrote the book almost in its entirety over a span of about six weeks. When I finished my first draft, I was essentially left with two novels --- the novel I had intended to write and the one I ended up writing after the insurrection. All of the events had to be pushed back in time and largely rewritten and recast…challenging to say the least.” But despite these obstacles, Silva still met his publisher's deadline for the book's manuscript, pulling it off in time for his traditional July publication.

THE CELLIST opens as Viktor Orlov, a close friend of Gabriel Allon, is found dead in his London home by Sarah Bancroft. A former CIA operative who worked with Gabriel, Sarah is now enjoying a more quiet life managing Isherwood Fine Arts. She discovered a very rare painting in dire need of restoration, so she sold it to Orlov, a Russian billionaire philanthropist who had been living in seclusion. Sarah was to pick up a check for the restoration but arrived to find his lifeless body. Familiar with signs of a contact poison used by the Russians, she suspects that the documents on Orlov's desk had been dosed with a poisonous nerve agent. 

Followers of Gabriel’s daring escapades will recognize characters from prior novels, even their disguises. Part One introduces us to the cellist of the title, Isabel Brenner, who just happens to work as a professional money launderer for the world’s most corrupt bank, RhineBank AG, in Germany. Gabriel recruits Isabel as the key to a complex fraud scheme to find Orlov's murderer.

The novel explores how Russia uses money as their greatest weapon. Silva expresses his belief that Vladimir Putin holds it as a weapon over his enemies: “A nuclear bomb can only be dropped once, but money can be wielded every day with no fallout and no threat of mutually assured destruction.” Russia “is rotting the institutional integrity of the West from within.” Putin is purported to be the wealthiest man in the world, richer than Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos combined.

Akin to a diabolical game of chess, THE CELLIST is a sophisticated voyage through the world of concert halls, art museums, lavish receptions and the occasional chase scene --- all delivered with Silva’s crafty dry wit and innuendo.