Devin's mom is killed leaving behind a story of a hidden large group of Russian spies. Is she crazy or has she uncovered a major threat to America? This is really her story. As Devin and a select few follow her clues to determine the truth of what he has uncovered in her apartment. The story is full of action. What if it isn't fiction?

Thank you to Netgalley for the opportunity to read and review this book. Did not finish. The action, that should be common for this genre, is little and far between. Very difficult to determine who the good and bad guys are. I like my stories simpler.

Fast paced action bearing inexorably down on the right side of the law (just). Classic Konkoly writing

ARC copy provided by Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
Deep Sleep is the first title in the Devin Gray series. This political thriller wasn't my cup of tea. It took me awhile to finish reading Deep Sleep.

Published by Thomas & Mercer on February 1, 2022

Deep Sleep is a “Russian sleeper network” story, a throwback to the days when spy thrillers focused on villains in Russia rather than China or the Middle East. The story does not end in the final chapter, so readers should be prepared to commit to reading at least one more book if they want to read a complete story.

The protagonist is Devin Gray. He’s a former FBI agent who now works in a private firm called MINERVA. (Other all-cap names of the kind that spy thriller writers love include DEVTEK and CONTROL). Gray’s mother Helen was a long-time operative of the CIA but she lost her job after she came to be seen as “psychotically paranoid.” And here I thought being psychotically paranoid was a job requirement.

Anyway, Helen kidnaps a man named Wilson and apparently kills a deputy sheriff before shooting herself. The reader will see that she didn’t kill the deputy but she definitely kidnaps Wilson and does some killing before she dies.

Gray’s mother had the foresight to send Gray messages that would be delivered in the event of her death. The messages take him to one of the few people who appeared at Helen’s funeral, a former CIA colleague named Karl Berg. From beyond the grave, Helen doles out clues to the location of a safehouse where, after a journey that occupies the first quarter of the novel, Gray and Berg find a room filled with files and surveillance photos.

The evidence that Gray’s mother assembled points to an ambitious Russian project. Not only did Russia place an unknown but large number of sleeper agents in the US back in the Soviet era, it made sure that the agents would breed, producing a second and possibly a third generation of loyal Russian spies. Now, everyone understands that American kids rebel against their parents. Instilling loyalty for Russia in kids who grow up as western materialists seems unlikely. Steven Konkoly tries to overcome that problem by sending the sleeper families to an annual summer camp near Branson, where loyalty to the motherland is reinforced. Kids who don’t get with the program (and parents who stray) end up at the bottom of a lake.

The story isn’t particularly credible but maybe it doesn’t need to be. This is an action story that hinges on surveillance drones and chases and shootouts and exploding helicopters. Credibility is an afterthought. At least Konkoly recognized the unlikely nature of his plot and tried to do something about it. Readers who enjoy the story can pretend he succeeded.

The other person who comes to Helen’s funeral is Marnie Young, a Marine helicopter pilot who is Gray’s good buddy and a potential love interest. Naturally, when it comes time to assemble a group to travel to Branson and check out the summer camp, Marnie tags along. Naturally, her ability to fly a helicopter turns out to be fortuitous.

Nothing much happens in this installment beyond setups and shootouts. We learn about some players in Russia. We meet the team of interchangeable mercenaries assembled by Berg. None of them, and for that matter none of the characters, including Gray, have any hint of a personality. After the action in Branson, the story fizzles out as Konkoly dumps another round of details that will presumably drive the next installment.

This installment is easy to read and the action is moderately entertaining, although there’s nothing in Deep Sleep that thriller fans will not have encountered many times before. Some of the book feels padded, likely because the premise doesn’t warrant multiple books. Maybe I will revise my thinking after (and if) I read the second installment. My guarded recommendation at this point is based on Konkoly's crisp writing style and his ability to hold my interest in a plot that would have been more timely during the Cold War.

RECOMMENDED WITH RESERVATIONS

Fast-paced, suspenseful, and entertaining. I really enjoyed this and will definitely check put more of the authors work.

Thanks to the author, publisher and NetGalley for this copy.

Deep sleep by Steven Konkoly.
Countersurveillance expert Devin Gray is unwittingly thrown headfirst into dangerous new territory after the death of his mother. Helen Gray, a paranoid and disgraced former CIA officer, believed she was on the verge of preventing a national catastrophe—a mission worth dying for. Others, including Devin, believe she was chasing delusions. Until he finds what she left behind. With the help of longtime friend and former Marine helicopter pilot Marnie Young and a loyal team of covert operatives Helen summoned just before her death, Devin is propelled into a high-stakes chase across the country. What he uncovers, clue by clue, is a conspiracy more widespread and insidious than anyone could have imagined. Now it’s Devin’s mission to destroy a covert network poised to deliver a fatal blow to the future of the United States. And also to vindicate his mother, by seeing the mission through to its treacherous end.
A good read with good characters. I did find this a little slow but readable. 3*.

Deep Sleep, by Steven Konkoly, is one of those books that gives you all the details throughout the book. The characters were interesting and the book is well written but it was too slow, for my taste. While there's a lot wrapped up in the last quarter of the book, the ending is a bit of a cliffhanger. For me, that's a bit of a negative.
Devin Gray, a countersurveillance expert finds himself careening headfirst into treacherous territory after his mother dies. Everyone thought that Helen Gray was paranoid, including those who worked with her in the CIA. She believed that she could stop a national disaster and that it was 100% worth dying for.
Devin puts together a top-notch, yet unexpected team of covert operatives. Now Devin is embroiled in a high-stakes hunt across America. He's ready to deal a fatal blow to any threat against the USA.

This is a very fast paced techno spy novel with thrills galore. A fantastic, gripping story with excellent characters and high stakes action. Another new author to me and one that I will certainly be reading more of in the future.

A thriller that moves across the country and continents with alacrity and lots of bad guys (and women), Devin Gray is certain that his mother Helen, a long time CIA officer, did not commit either treason or suicide but how to get to the truths. Fans of conspiracy novels will find a big one here- it's oddly both plausible and implausible. Devin assemblies a group of colleagues and pals to more or less save the US from the forces of evil. They're diverse and entertaining. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. Would make a good movie.

4.5 stars.

Well that was fun! Just occasionally I like to read to read a spy/intelligence/espionage thriller with all the latest toys for the boys.

When former CIA intelligence officer Helen Gray kills herself and others in a shootout miles from home everyone thinks she’s finally well and truly lost it. After all she had been getting more and more flaky for the last 20 years. Then her son, Devin a counterintelligence officer, gets a time delayed series of messages and instructions from his mother. He follows her instructions and finds….her secret lair - an apartment she had rented that could not be connected to her and where she had laid out all her research into an unthinkable conspiracy.

As Devin scans the files and the walls he realises his mother was not crazy at all. She had done all this in secret to protect herself and her family. She had uncovered a decades old Russian plan to insert sleeper agents into the US and their children, the second generation, were already, or poised to be, in positions of great influence. The numbers were staggering and the implications were frightening. His mother’s friend and mentor comes out of retirement and puts together a team of top notch operatives. Devin calls on his friend Marnie Young who had been a marine helicopter pilot with combat experience.

After a couple of narrow escapes where the Russians had used the aged, original sleepers, things got a lot more serious as proper troops were deployed. Devin and his lot need to find the secret training and indoctrination camp in the Ozarks and secure enough evidence to prove the conspiracy beyond a doubt.

There are lots of gun battles and it’s not just the lads having fun, there are some women on both sides too - yay for feminism! This was highly entertaining escapism which I do like as counterpoint to serial killers and child abuse and other dark things. I’m guessing it’s the start of a series. I hadn’t heard of Steven Konkoly before but his name is now definitely on my radar and I’d certainly like to read the follow up to this book. Many thanks to Netgalley and Thomas & Mercer for the much appreciated arc which I reviewed voluntarily and honestly.

I received this book through "NetGalley".

This story introduces Devin Gray whose life has been turned upside down by his mother's antics. The latest episode that she did has wound up with her being killed, but before that occurred, she activated a program to send Devin a recorded telephone message. Devin and his team that he worked for were put on leave after the tast job that they performed. During this time, he was notified of his mother's death and later received the taped message asking for his help. He wound up meeting a colleague of his mother during her funeral. Devin along with Karl, his mother's friend, discovered a treasure trove of information that reflected the cause that she had been working on over the last few years. The information was so detailed that Karl got associates of his involved to assist. As it turns out, the party that killed Devin's mother was looking for the evidence that Devin discovered. The party was also the group that killed his mother and were targeting him as well to get information.

The activities that Devin and his group took was not without consequences and it took all their skill to survive. Devin's group finally located the camp that Devin's mother had been searching for and the group made arrangements to scope it out. At the same time, tis group sent a team to prevent any sort of discovery. When the groups eventually met, all sorts of action ensued.

To discover who was the party responsible for Devin's mother 's death, what trove of information Deven and Karl discovered and why this group was so anxious to get their hands on it and what event happened at the camp and what steps they took to protect themselves, then you need to read this book. The ending will have you impatiently waiting for the next book in the series to learn what happened next.

Book Review: Deep Sleep (Devin Gray #1) by Steven Konkoly
Published by Thomas & Mercer, February 1, 2022

★★★★☆ (4.25 Stars)

Following his action-packed four-book "Ryan Decker" series, author Steven Konkoly's new "Devin Gray" military /political thriller reads like a crescendo rising to the apogee of his body of work, as he injects vintage John le Carré and Richard Condon cold war themes into his own brand of fast-paced, non-stop action thrillers.

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Haifa, Israel.
The Israeli seaport city is dealt a death blow by rocket attacks, undeterred, due to a sudden and mysterious failure of Israel's vaunted Iron Dome missile defense system.

Somewhere in Tennessee.
An ex-CIA operator believes she'd uncovered something insidious that had taken root in America and had somehow gone unnoticed for fifty years. Rejected by her superiors, she sacrifices her job and family in a two-decade pursuit to track names disclosed to her by a GRU general.

"Don't let them waste it", he had said.

And now she finally has in her grasp a man shrouded in mystery.

Washington, D.C.
An ex-Special Agent and twelve-year veteran of the FBI's Special Surveillance Group leads a private industrial espionage, counterintelligence and surveillance team to secure a defecting Defense software engineer.

Chattanooga, Tennessee.
For over thirty years, a team of foreign operators, all American citizens, have executed dirty wet work and blind delivery jobs for someone they'd never met and only knew by a codename: CONTROL.

Enter an ace Marine helicopter pilot, battle-hardened in Iraq where she'd served several tours. Along with the ex-FBI Special Agent and a mercenary team of ex-CIA operators, they see the existential threat to the country, all too aware of lamentable shortcomings in their own government.

They decide to do something about it.

Enter a post-Soviet Putin-disciple and Russian industrialist, billionaire and spymaster with his hands on three generations of sleepers imbedded in American politics, academia, technology, industry, intelligence, the Pentagon and the US military.

All highly trained in a camp deeply buried in the Ozarks.

All with the singular ultimate purpose of sabotage and destruction.

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This is one series that promises to enter veritably explosive complications.

Compelling. Unputdownable!

Review based on an advance reading copy courtesy of Thomas & Mercer and NetGalley.

A techno-thriller chill ride from start to finish! Countersurveillance expert Devin Grey meets the unexpected when his Mom, a disgraced former CIA who thought she was still on a mission of supreme importance, dies. Well when Devin finds just what she has left behind, he is pulled into a high-stakes race across the country, and every clue he uncovers makes him realize how deep the conspiracy his Mom uncovered really goes! The USA may be dealt a deadly blow, soon, if Devin cannot see this mission through...
This is a long story, but the astounding twists, deceits, and action grab you by the throat and just do Not let up until the very end. The characters feel so real, like you are sitting right there with them and trying to figure out what to do next. I was so excited about this book when I was only 40% through I had to email the author about it's greatness! I didn't enjoy the way it ends, a little quickly. But I can see that the story does go on, so am Very excited about that! I highly recommend this to all who enjoy espionage, you will be reading as fast as you can until the end.
I received an ARC from NetGalley and the author, who I thank, and I offer you my honest thoughts and feelings in this review.

First review of 2022. I started the year with Deep Sleep by Steven Konkoly. It's a brand new series featuring Devin Gray. I found this book really great and well written with a terrifying storyline. I am a big fan of the tv show The Americans and if you like me liked it you will love this book. This book has its share of suspense, intrigue, action and thrills. I am really looking forward to see where Konkoly will bring my new hero and his band of miscreants. Hats of to you sir for once again coming up with a set of characters to my liking. I will recommend this to anyone who will listen to me. I have to thank @netgalley @amazonpublishing and #Thomas AndMercer for giving me this advance copy of #DeepSleep by #StevenKonkoly #NetGalley

I've read many books by Steven Konkoly and have enjoyed them all. This one, like all of them was easy to read and fast paced. Good characters and pacing. I highly recommend this book.

I admit it freely. I’m a fan of Steve’s. I’ve ready pretty much everything he has written and enjoyed it. But.. this one is special. I believe this is his best book yet. I’m not going to get into why because I don’t want to spoil anything. Just trust me and get this book and enjoy it like I did. In my opinion, one of my favorite reads this year.

Another great book by Steven Konkoly that was very hard to put down. The plot was plausible.and while a totally new series with new prime characters some of our old "friends" are back. Highly recommended.

This is the first book I have read from this author and I must say it was a great read.

It had all of the ingredients to make this a fantastic read! We have Devin, a countersurveillance expert thrown against his wishes into a dangerous situation. He needs to get rid of a covert network. However, it will not be easy.

There was enough suspense to keep me on the edge of my seat. This book grabs you from the beginning and does not let go until the very end.

Counter surveillance expect Devin Gray is thrust into a far-reaching conspiracy involving Russian sleeper agents in Deep Sleep, new from Steven Konkoly. I’ve loved the author’s Ryan Decker series, and his new novel is an absolute winner! With long time friend Marnie, a marine cooter pilot, Devin joins forces with a mercenary group to untangle a web of sleeper spies, first uncovered by Devin’s mother, a CIA agent. What follows is an intense, action packed novel, expertly told, with seemingly unconnected characters all coming together at different points, resulting in a truly unputdownable novel that flies by. With many loose ends, this book is obviously the start of a series, one which I am eagerly looking forward to. Outstanding, 5 stars! I received an ARC of this book from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.