So the author of this first novel is a former CIA operative, which didn't make me well disposed to it. But it's set in the sleazy and unpleasant world of Gulf state expats, and that's rather well depicted. And the Agency were presented as dishonest and not very bright, which made me like it more. Lots of well described settings, a decent plot that rolls along (though with one or two blind alleys that I didn't really understand), and by the end I was quite enjoying it.
I have to say the denouement wasn't so good. The opposition to the regime (it's set in Bahrain, after the very Arab Spring moment that happened there) turn out to have been the Iranian backed Shiite authoritarians that the CIA and the regime said they were, and they end up taking over Bahrain and using it as a launch pad for a nuclear-armed regional Shiite movement against America and human rights and gay people and books...
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