Former FBI agents turned private investigators Sean King and Michelle Maxwell are back for another round of intrigue and near death misses in David Baldacci’s Simple Genius. After moving back to Washington DC work is hard to come by and money is tight. When Michelle goes out of her way to cause a bar fight that lands her in a psych ward, Sean is forced to go to former lover and vice president of a big PI firm, Joan Dillinger, to try and get some work so there is money to pay for Michelle’s stay at the facility.
Joan begrudgingly gives Sean an assignment investigating the apparent suicide of scientist and mathematical genius Monk Turning at CIA run Camp Peary, more commonly known as “The Farm”. Turning worked across the river from Camp Peary at a facility called Babbage Town, where highly skilled teams are working on secret projects that could make or break the United States. No one at Babbage Town has any idea why Monk would have gone across the river and trespassed on CIA property to end his life (if it was suicide), or at least no one is saying admitting anything.
When another death involving a Babbage Town employee occurs under mysterious circumstances, Sean has all the more reason to wonder what really happened to Monk Turning and what is really going on both at Camp Peary and with the scientists at Babbage Town. Sean could really use the help of his partner, but Michelle is still being treated for her psychological problems by Sean’s frient, psychiatrist Horatio Barnes.
Can Sean learn the truth behind the iron curtain of secrecy in Virginia? Can Michelle deal with her own personal demons and get better, or will she shove them under the rug and make her way to Sean’s side to help him investigate Babbage Town and Camp Peary? When Turning’s daughter gets caught in the fray, the case keeps taking one more unforseen turn after another at an alarming pace.
This wasn’t my favorite Sean King/Michelle Maxwell story, but Simple Genius does give the reader the opportunity to learn more about what makes Michelle tick and just how far she and Sean will go to save the lives of strangers, and each other.
Book Reviews from an Avid Reader 