About the Author

Peter Riva has spent many months over 30 years travelling throughout Africa and Europe. Much of this time was spent with the legendary guides for East African hunters and adventurers. He created a TV series in 1995 called Wild Things for Paramount. Passing on the fables, true tales, and insider knowledge of these last reserves of true wildlife is his passion. Nonetheless, his job for over forty years has been working as a literary agent. In his spare time, Riva writes science fiction and African adventure books. He lives in Gila, New Mexico.

More information about Peter Riva can be found on his official website and his Facebook page.  Ask him questions on Twitter—he’s nice!

About the Book

Film producer Pero Baltazar thought he was taking a Berlin filming assignment. He needed the work, needed to get back in the saddle after fighting off a life-threatening experience in East Africa—alShabaab had attacked his crew, intent on a much larger terrorist attack. Suddenly he finds himself under orders from his part-time employers at the State Department and the CIA when he is handed a mysterious package. It’s an assignment he doesn’t want. The problem is, it’s a job contracted by mysterious patrons who are prepared to kill him if he doesn’t deliver.

Pero—now in far too deep—turns to friends, old and new, to help him unravel the mystery of the package, uncover connections to Nazi concentration camp gold recently sold by the US Treasury, and thwart the ex–Stasi chief, now head of a powerful banking group.

In this fast-paced sequel to Murder on Safari, Pero calls on Mbuno, his friend and East African safari guide, to anticipate the moves of his enemies as if they were animals—dangerous vermin—who have kidnapped both the film star and director. Mbuno’s tracking skills may keep them from getting killed—provided Pero can rope in more help and keep the CIA at bay.

Exhilarating and expertly crafted, The Berlin Package (Yucca Publishing; April 2016) is a gripping, page-turning thriller set in post–German reunification Europe.

Book Review

The same elements which have become familiar in the prequel, Murder on Safari, make a return in The Berlin Package: main protagonist Pero Baltazar, some of his friends who help him along, Pero’s contact at the CIA, and a series of events that come at them back to back in an intriguing and fun to follow thriller.  Yet again, author Peter Riva goes beyond the ploys used in mass-produced thrillers.  Instead of making up for a watered down plot by adding emotional ploys to keep readers going, The Berlin Package has a tight plot filled with details that will do a much effective job doing the same.

Riva has also written two science fiction books I recently reviews, The Path and Reaching Angelica; just like with Murder on Safari, The Berlin Package does not have as much to reflect on as the first two titles.  While Murder on Safari could potentially help open minds to some of the realities common to large parts of the African continent, The Berlin Package provides some interesting historical facts about post World War II events.  I haven’t checked to see if these events are true or not—or even based on true facts—but they are very interesting to go through and, in the current climate of greed-fuelled distrust, make one wonder about many a thing.

Just like with any author, there are certain things about Riva’s style which, after reading four of his books back to back, start becoming a little irritating; one in particular is the choppy, jerky way that the characters express themselves.  Although meant to reflect the reality of how people talk in stressful situations, it disturbs the flow of reading, making it go from smooth to halting.  But this is not reason enough to discourage anyone from reading The Berlin Package or any other one of Riva’s books.  They are meant to entertain and, in the case of this thrillers, to get readers’ hearts pumping—and indeed they manage to do both quite well.

Thank you to iReads Book Tours for providing a
copy of this book for me to review!

Purchase Links

Purchase the book on Amazon, at Barnes & Noble, Book Depository, or at Chapters/Indigo.

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