Self-pitying golden boy trader Jay Novacek is having a bad week when he finds himself thrown into a race to save the world from a horrific conspiracy straight out of the darkest hours of history. Could secret human experimentations be carried out worldwide? Can it be stopped? This fast-paced thriller took France by storm when it was first published, reaping superlatives: “Spellbinding,” “exceptional,” “staggering,” captivating,” “brilliant,” “astounding,””fascinating.” Think a dash of Robin Cook,  a splash of John Grisham and a pinch of Clive Cussler with a very distinctive voice all it’s own. The book catapulted its author, David Khara, into the ranks of the country’s top thriller writers.

I’ve been impressed with every translation put out by the digital-first publisher Le French Book. My favourite is still The 7th Woman (by Frédérique Molay), but The Bleiberg Project runs a close second. This is an excellent thriller that everyone should pick up.

From the present day, to the harrowing days of WWII, The Bleiberg Project is a fantastical story that kept me reading. Khara builds suspense by flashing back to events during the war, and giving the reader hints, and he adeptly moves between characters. As a writer myself, I was interested to see how Khara worked in a first-person point of view (Jay Novacek) and third-person point of views (Eytan Morg, et al). The switch from first to third didn’t bother me, and I thought it might. But using Jay as first-person narrator gives the reader an ‘in’ so we can more easily get into the story and caught up in the suspense.

However, I was most fascinated by Eytan Morg, the assassin for Mossad, and the twists in his story surprised me. I’m hoping that isn’t the end of Eytan’s character. I can’t really say more, for fear of spoilers, and I really wouldn’t want to spoil this book for you.

This is another great read from the team at LeFrenchBook — I am so glad that someone is intent on making translations of award-winning, impressive crime and thriller novels from French into English. I’m hoping that LeFrenchBook will bring more of Khara’s work into their upcoming catalogue.

My thanks to Le French Book for providing a copy for an honest review.