After Dinner Conversation – Interview with Joe Giordano
A great thriller rises on the shoulders of its main character. He must carry the novel by being clever, worldly, and above all else, likable. These are the attributes of Anthony Provati, the 34-year-old Italian American protagonist in Joe Giordano’s excellent new novel – Drone Strike.
Fans of the author know Anthony Provati well. Giordano introduced readers to his main protagonist in a previous engaging thriller, Appointment with ISIL. We go to know Provati as a native New Yorker who owns a tiny art gallery in Soho. Always pressed for money, he finds himself in schemes and predicaments that have worldwide repercussions.
In Drone Strike, Provati finds himself an idyllic existence with his girlfriend Nori on the Greek island of Santorini. A skilled pianist and sailor, he’s able to make a living either playing piano at a small nightclub or manning a sailboat. The good life, however, is not to be had after an earthquake strikes the region and Nori suffers a severe head injury. Although medical care is free in Greece, we learn that the public hospitals there are grossly mismanaged. The best option is a private hospital for Nori to receive round-the-clock care while she remains in a coma. Provati is desperate to pay for it all. He takes a job as a sailboat captain to transfer illegal migrants from Greece to Italy. Unbeknownst to Provati, one of the passengers is an ISIL terrorist.
Great fiction can enlighten readers beyond mainstream coverage of world events. Giordano has researched the Middle East, Islam and the history of terrorism. He gives us two key characters – Karim and Miriam, victims, in different ways, of Middle East violence. Miriam is a Syrian Christian, who was raped by ISIL thugs, after they killed her family. She met Karim at a Turkish refugee camp and together they made their way to Greece. Much of the story revolves around Karim, a chemical engineer from ISIL-controlled Iraq. The novel begins with an American drone striking a car of terrorists near his house. He is thrown back from the blast but not seriously hurt. He sees his home destroyed and finds his wife Farrah and two children dead amidst the rubble. How to make sense of the tragedy leads him to the domain of terrorists. He follows the words of one, Al-Nasir, an ISIL leader: “Like buzzing flies, Americans wave off reports of murdered Islamic women and children. They switch their televisions to reality shows and wallow in their morally bankrupt existences…You’ll continue to suffer for your loss, but Americans remain indifferent.”
Giordano takes the reader on a grand tour of the Middle East war zone. We follow Karim to a Jihadi camp in the Iraqi desert that trains suicide bombers. He travels through Syria with a fake passport. The Mediterranean becomes the main setting as Karim claims refugee status and is allowed to enter Turkey. When he is captured in Greece, we are confronted with the impotency of law enforcement. Faced with dire financial conditions, the country is unable to fund the manpower needed to secure its border. Karim is not sentenced to prison. Instead, “the judge continued, ‘As the jails haven’t room for all the illegal immigrants coming into our country, I’m suspending your sentence and ordering you to leave Greece within a month.’” The time allows Karim to find a way to sneak out of Greece and make his way to Italy with help from Provati.
Personal tragedy is the central chord that unites the characters in Drone Strike. Giordano goes beyond the action to explore the motivations, thoughts and deeds of heroes and villains. At root is faith and the mystery of God’s intervention; an important theme in the novel since Middle East violence is religious based.
In Appointment with ISIL, Giordano was hailed as a thoughtful and creative author who gave us a dynamic character in Anthony Provati in a contemporary adventure. Giordano has now exceeded himself with Drone Strike. This is an exceptional novel that is as thrilling as it is illuminating.”
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