Haggai Carmon

My intelligence thrillers were inspired by my Israeli professional background, as well as by my twenty years of service for the United States Government. During those years, I had a publicly known 'daytime' activity as well as a covert 'nighttime' activity. From 1985 through 2016, I have been representing the United States government in civil ligation, appearing in Israeli courts in lawsuits to which the U.S was a party. However, away from the public eye, I was also engaged by the U.S government to perform intelligence gathering that required sensitive undercover work in more than thirty countries. Obviously, in my years working for U.S. federal agencies, I could not share the hair-raising aspects of my work with anyone but my supervisors, and some adventures not even with them. Sadly, many of these events, which are sometimes more fascinating and breathtaking than the best fiction I have ever read, will never see the light of day. The story of Dan Gordon and his battle against the invisible FOE ' forces of evil'is my idea of the next-best thing. To keep in touch, I finally joined the U.S Association of Former Intelligence Officers.

A globetrotting legal practice has left little time for hobbies. However, one night in a small hotel in a faraway country, I finally had the time to fulfill my urge to write. I was on U.S government assignment collecting intelligence. Earlier that evening, I'd received a phone call from the local INTERPOL contact. "You've been exposed. I suggest you stay in your hotel. We'll arrange for your safe departure tomorrow morning." Is it any wonder I couldn't sleep that night, between jet lag and the rage that came from being unarmed and unable to leave the hotel without my hosts' protection? I poured it all into the writing, and the result was Triple Identity, my first thriller.

That book turned out not to be a fluke; I wrote the four sequels because I realized I still had adventures to recount, including about events surrounding that same long and sleepless night.

Readers have also asked whether the events recounted there really happened. One newspaper reviewer even accused me of writing "too authentic" a novel, while another reviewer praised me for it. How can you argue with that? My next thrillers may meet a similar reaction. As to how much of them is "true," I leave it to my readers to decide. All my thrillers were inspired by my work for the U.S. government, but they are a work of fiction rather than autobiography. During those two decades, I was assigned the demanding, sometimes-dangerous task of collecting intelligence in many foreign countries. That explains why sometimes, waking up in countless hotels in more than thirty countries, I had trouble remembering where I was. Walking in the long corridors of foreign airports, it was hard to remember whether I was arriving or departing.

More thrillers in the series are to follow. In my professional life, I have had enough adventures, frequently dangerous, to fill at least ten books, and those are just the ones I can talk about.