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This review was originally published on Pop-topia.com in March 2014.

I Am Pilgrim

By Terry Hayes

Publisher: Atria Books

Release Date: May 27th, 2014

I think it will come as no surprise to people that after I finished reading I Am Pilgrim, I felt it had a sharply developed cinematic feel to the proceedings.

Given the screenwriting background of author Terry Hayes, the novel's expansive and widescreen feel is almost a certified requirement. If the devil is in the details, his initial work as a reporter certainly gave him an eye for said details. His work on films such as From Hell, Payback, The Road Warrior and Vertical Limit gives him the cache of being a solid man of action in the big screen world.

But what makes the prose in I Am Pilgrim - Hayes' debut as an author - all that more enlivened is that unlike a movie where you can't obsess over details at the expense of moving the story along, a novel lets you flesh out any of the particulars you want and lets the reader envelop themselves in the sights and sounds of a particular scene.

While a seedy motel room occupied by a body that has spent three days in a bathtub full of acid might not be anyone's idea of a tourist spot destination, Terry Hayes manages to make you feel every second, every sight and every nasty vibe you could expect to find in such a location.

And that's where we come in at the beginning of I Am Pilgrim - a New York motel room discovery invariably leads to more bodies, seemingly unconnected, but inexorably each new death is a link in a chain that leads to an ingenious terrorist plot designed to destroy America.

The man known as "Pilgrim" is a man who doesn't exist...with exception to the shadowy recesses of a long defunct black ops intelligence agency. He's the unknown author of the greatest investigative technique handbook, a man apart who finds himself tracked down by a brilliant NYPD detective and finds himself attached to the motel room murder case despite a clear desire to stay far away from any sort of ties to the "real" world.

As the story unfolds, we find out through Pilgrim's narration all the details of his life and that of the antagonist who led them on their soon to be collision course. The details of each story are well drawn and invariably exciting to make your way through. Each character has lived a life of high drama and intrigue. A life in service to country and/or an ideal.

Further stepping up the quality of the story is how the supporting characters are fleshed out in such ways that they are not only thoroughly integral to the process but you actually want to run into them again. Hell, they could headline their own stories if the author so desired.

I'm not quite sure how much of the details of the story are real world possible as opposed to fantastical flights of semi-grounded fantasy, but I do know that the ability of Hayes to make me wonder about the state of security on some of the most important every day details of modern life managed to scare the hell out of me. An entertaining scare tactic? Why yes indeed, that is a job well done in my estimation.

As I read the story, the main character narration gave me the feeling of a more intense episode of the TV show "Burn Notice". The descriptions of a life lived as a spy where you never know who or what to trust fully gave a slightly claustrophobic twist to the narrative.

While Pilgrim gets dragooned back into his old spy life in order to stop the latest plot to end American life as we know it, the story spreads out into an international hopscotch of locales. A black ops guide to the world if you will. You might not want to pick up a postcard on these trips but you won't soon forget that you've been there.

The best spy novels aren't always the ones that feature endless firefights and explosions. In I Am Pilgrim, you get the hunt for the most wanted man in world, a man whose plan to destroy the country will curdle your blood. But the minutiae of the hunt, how to track "the bad guy" who lives off the grid, is not given short shrift so there can be another gun battle. There's plenty of action, but each scene is filtered into the book judiciously.

It is used in advancement of the plot rather than just a silly gun battle between faceless minions. It shows the attention to detail necessary to craft a top notch spy thriller and not just simply marketing to movie makers as others are wont to do these days.

With all that being said, there was one thing that continually drew me out of the story. The choice by the author for the narrative to be told from the viewpoint of Pilgrim at some point in the future after the case had been resolved took the overall suspense factor down quite a bit.

You expect the main character to survive the tale he's the star of, but most books I read or prefer, they aren't telling you ahead of time that they win "the game". They don't actually do that here, but the framing devices as you learn step by step what is going on tends to ruin the "What If" factor in regards to the story resolution.

However, you'll note that if you leave that particular criticism aside, you can delve deep into the story and be amazed at the level of detail in even the smallest of scenes. The story's denouement even manages to bring out the less than heroic side of our tale's man of action. It adds a final shading to the character and leaves you that much more in awe of a tale well told.

I Am Pilgrim was originally published in the UK in mid-2013 but it is due here in the US on May 27th.

When I first saw that the book was 600 pages long, I was worried there might be too much in the way of filler, making it unnecessarily long. What I found is that I could've read the book if it was even longer. I wanted to spend more time in this particular world. I wanted to get to know these characters even more.

If you like spy thrillers, if you like drama and intrigue...if you simply are in need of a book that will make your heart skip a beat while potentially scaring the bejeezus out of you over the complexities of a madman's plot against your way of life, Terry Hayes is your man and I Am Pilgrim is your novel.

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