The Collector

New York Times best-selling Silva offers a riveting page-turner with this 23rd installment in the Gabriel Allon series (following Portrait of an Unknown Woman). Retired Israeli master spy Gabriel Allon, along with his wife and their two children, are living a quiet life in Venice. While investigating the murder of shipping tycoon Lukas van Damme, the Italian police discover an empty picture frame and stretcher the exact size of a Vermeer painting stolen from Boston’s Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in the 1990s. General Cesare Ferrari, commander of the Italian police’s Art Squad, convinces Gabriel to come out of retirement and search for the missing painting. Ingrid Johansen, an enigmatic new character who is a brilliant career thief and cyber-hacker, is persuaded to join the investigation, and together they prevent a nuclear disaster. Narrator Edoardo Ballerini provides an outstanding performance, giving the characters unique voices and capturing their distinctive accents.