Making a killing in North Korea

In his latest novel, “The Target”, Baldacci transports his readers to one of the most enigmatic and dangerous places on the planet: North Korea.

“North Korea is a threat to us all with its rogue nature and nukes. That’s the reason I’m interested,” Baldacci tells The Star. 

“It is fascinating to me that such a country could exist in the world, in 2014. Even Iranians are connected to the Internet and use Facebook and Twitter. Not so the North Koreans!”

In “The Target”, government hitman Will Robie and his partner Jessica Reel find themselves on what may be their toughest mission yet (this is the third book in the series). The US president discovers an opportunity to take down a global menace once and for all – but if the mission fails, he faces certain impeachment, and the threats against America would multiply. With all that riding on their shoulders, the situation gets more complicated with Reel suffering a personal crisis, one that could lead old enemies right to her doorstep, bringing stark danger to all those close to her.

Baldacci researched hard to create the book’s most memorable scenes – those set behind the barbed wire of one of  North Korea’s notorious labour camps.

“There is a lot of literature available on North Korea and I read a ton of it. I also knew some people with some knowledge of the country and its culture. Then it was up to me to craft fictional characters and choose how much fact I wanted to blend in with the fiction. I think the result is pretty memorable.”

One of the book’s most discussed points is the character Yie Chung-Cha, a ruthless North Korean female assassin dispatched to take out Robie and Reel.

“I wanted to see if I could take a character who, based on her past, should have not a shred of humanity left and could hardly be blamed for simply being a killing machine, and see if I could find a human being with a beating heart still inside of her. It was a wonderful experience crafting such a character,” Baldacci says.

With all the research he’s done on assassins and US Secret Service agents for his novels, could the author possibly be able to handle such a line of work, we wonder.

“I would have a hard time taking someone’s life unless they were directly threatening me. I get upset when animals are hurt, much less people,” he replies.

Asked about his future projects, Baldacci says he’s working on a new thriller in his John Puller series entitled “The Escape”, and a follow-up to his young-adult-fiction title, “The Finisher”.

He also recently published an e-book, “Bullseye”, which hogged the top of the Kindle chart for eight weeks. This short story is a crossover, featuring Will Robie and Oliver Stone, the protagonist of Baldacci’s best-selling Camel Club novels.

Will there be more crossovers with characters from his different books series?

“I never say never,” Baldacci says.

 

 

The Target

By David Baldacci

Available at major bookshops, Bt567

Reviewed by Terence Toh