Too much repetition and incredible event let me down in this one .. a socially modified young woman hiding out (by running a security business!!??) Is target for big government affect .. but a victim she'd planned to shoot is shot mysteriously by someone unknown to her .. her temporary flatmate knows nothing of this secret life and is heavily pregnant .. I just did not get beyond halfway .

Bianca is very young, attractive and a thief. A very capable spy and master of the martial arts and how to handle weapons she is not an easy target but that is what she has become. The final nail in her coffin was when a murder alert was put out on her with a million dollar bounty. She knew it was only a matter of time before her luck ran out.

What Bianca had to do was find out what she could exchange in which was of value to her opposition. What they wanted seemed near impossible. The artifacts from a well guarded museum in Russia which Germany believed was rightfully theirs. How Bianca sets up on this subterfuge ringing in a band of gypsies well versed in the arts of being slightly off the grid is told in this complicated story.

Apart from the bare bones of the story we have Bianca's own history - her birth is from the fantasy genre and her father who is not her father is heart rendingly cold and indifferent to her well being. This was the only human element of the story. That Bianca felt his indifference, despite the training he gave her and then there was his final betrayal.

Very fast paced, interesting reading.

Although The Moscow Deception, a second instance in the Guardian Series, has 'a novel' on the front cover, I would prefer thriller as a genre identifier. I didn't read the first book but found no impediments to join Bianca St. Ives, a smart tech-savvy top-notch criminal, that goes by many names. For her, survival and outsmart her pursuers is her only mission. She can change outfits and personalities as quick as you turn pages to read on. She's on a mission for the perfect robbery of the heavily guarded King Priam’s Treasure from a Moscow museum and transfers to Germany, where the treasure belonged until World War II broke out.

She's a price on her head and constantly aware that her death is nearby. A professional sniper herself or having arranged narrow escapes, she's helped or nearly attacked herself on several occasions in various places on the planet. It's one of the funny elements in the book. Despite being armed 24/7 Bianca doesn't use that much of her weaponry. The thriller is much more about coming to understand family ties and get the job done, despite the many distractions, whether it's a good looking fellow, other espionage pros, or her regular consultancy job. Well-written with enough twists and open endings have a sequel.

Not having read the first book in this series, I had some difficulty with getting used to the style. The book starts with a very well written chapter in which we, besides the action, learn who Bianca is and what has happened in her (recent) past. The story goes on with telling us more about what she is doing for a living, her friends and so on. As soon as she discovers there is a price on her head, she needs to come into action and it is - of course - inevitable that her past plays a role again.

I've given the book 4 stars because in parts it is really excellently written. There is one scene in a casino that made me sit on the edge of my chair - literally. Very, very good. On the other hand, for the story itself, and the way it is told, I would rather give it 3 stars. It is just not very well balanced. Next to the excellent scene at the casino, at the end of the book I got the feeling the author was getting a bit tired and thus a part of the story that took more than a week was penned down in three or four sentences. Sentences that looked as if the author didn't have the faintest idea how to solve the problems Bianca encountered.

Furthermore, Bianca is just a little too perfect for me; she cannot only do everything she wants, she also knows so many people that every time she encounters a problem, she calls on somebody else, mainly from her past - the past that is playing such a big role in this book.

All in all, I think it would have been better if I would have read the first book in the series too. On the other hand, I hope that in the third book the story will be better balanced because I think it would benefit from it.

Thanks to NetGalley for this book.