Publisher's Weekly Review
British journalist Lebor (Hitler's Secret Bankers) introduces brilliant and beautiful Yael Azoulay, a behind-the-scenes negotiator for the United Nations, in his gripping debut thriller, the first in a trilogy. In Goma, Congo, Yael tries to persuade the president of the Rwandan Liberation Front, Jean-Pierre Hakizimani, to make peace with the Rwandan government and surrender to a U.N. tribunal. On returning to New York, Yael is dismayed to discover she's lost her job; she's even more dismayed by the suspicious death of her trusted friend Olivia de Souza, an assistant to U.N. Secretary-General Fareed Hussein. And just who leaked Yael's confidential encoded memo to Hussein to a New York Times reporter? As Yael goes rogue to ferret out answers to these puzzles, she peels away layers of intrigue. The action can be overblown at times, but those looking for a strong heroine in the mold of Lisbeth Salander will be satisfied. Agent: Elizabeth Sheinkman, William Morris. (June) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Booklist Review
*Starred Review* This thriller's prologue is a small masterpiece in showing how the seemingly banal a worker taking a cigarette break on a balcony can be upended into terror. The rest of the book fulfills the prologue's promise, in ways completely credible and, thus, even scarier. Lebor, a British journalist who has covered the UN for the Times (London), brings an investigative reporter's deep knowledge to cracks within the UN's dealings. His heroine, Yael Azoulay, a UN negotiator, has just finished convincing a former Hutu warlord, guilty of many murders of Tutsis in the 1994 Rwandan genocide, to surrender to authorities in exchange for an eventual return to power. What Yael does not realize is that the UN has used her to set up some stability in the region, thus enabling Western powers to get their hands on the mineral coltan, vital for cell phones and computers but devastating to the Congolese children who often die mining it. After Yael leaks a memo to a New York Times reporter, she is suspended, pending investigation. Yael is determined to get to the bottom of what the UN, businesspeople, and politicians are planning in order to control coltan. Yael's experience and the files she's secretly uploaded enable her to investigate the corrupt cabal, leading to scene after scene of heart-clutching suspense in Africa, Switzerland, and New York. This is the first of a projected trilogy starring Yael Azoulay. Must reading.--Fletcher, Connie Copyright 2010 Booklist
New York Review of Books Review
If polyglot ethnic heritage secured a person's influence at the United Nations, Yael Azoulay, a negotiator whose family tree sprawls from Iraq to Israel, would be in line for top dog. As a U.N. official whose job description requires brokering deals with dictators, she's powerful enough to get herself into very hot water by Page 29 of Le Bor's tightly knotted thriller. Many monsters prey upon Yael: a Rwandan mass murderer, corporate executives and U.N. policy makers whose nambypamby approach to conflict resolution has enabled ethnic cleansers of all stripes. As a glimpse into U.N. workings, however, "The Geneva Option" succeeds less as indictment of organizational paralysis than insider's guide. LeBor shows facility with the telling detail, but indulges one too many conventions of the genre: the stain on the protagonist's past, a sinister albino and a rapacious German conglomerate. The author also sends out very mixed signals about gender and power. The American president is a woman, credibly enough, yet in the line of duty Yael herself is compelled to play the pliant sex kitten on multiple occasions.
