The Spy Coast: A Thriller (The Martini Club)

A retired CIA operative in small-town Maine tackles the ghosts of her past in this fresh take on the spy thriller from New York Times bestselling author Tess Gerritsen.

Former spy Maggie Bird came to the seaside village of Purity, Maine, eager to put the past behind her after a mission went tragically wrong. These days, she’s living quietly on her chicken farm, still wary of blowback from the events that forced her early retirement.

But when a body turns up in Maggie’s driveway, she knows it’s a message from former foes who haven’t forgotten her. Maggie turns to her local circle of old friends―all retirees from the CIA―to help uncover the truth about who is trying to kill her, and why. This “Martini Club” of former spies may be retired, but they still have a few useful skills that they’re eager to use again, if only to spice up their rather sedate new lives.

Complicating their efforts is Purity’s acting police chief, Jo Thibodeau. More accustomed to dealing with rowdy tourists than homicide, Jo is puzzled by Maggie’s reluctance to share information―and by her odd circle of friends, who seem to be a step ahead of her at every turn.

As Jo’s investigation collides with the Martini Club’s maneuvers, Maggie’s hunt for answers will force her to revisit a clandestine career that spanned the globe, from Bangkok to Istanbul, from London to Malta. The ghosts of her past have returned, but with the help of her friends―and the reluctant Jo Thibodeau―Maggie might just be able to save the life she’s built.

International bestselling author Tess Gerritsen took an unusual route to a writing career. A Stanford University graduate, Tess went on to gain her MD at the University of California, San Francisco.

While on maternity leave as a physician, she began to write fiction. She published her first novel in 1987 and has since sold over forty million copies of books in forty countries, winning the Nero Wolfe Award and the RITA Award.

Her novels have been top-three US bestsellers and number one bestsellers abroad. Critics worldwide praise her novels as “pulse-pounding fun” (Philadelphia Inquirer), “scary and brilliant” (Toronto Globe and Mail), and “polished, riveting prose” (Chicago Tribune). Publishers Weekly has dubbed her the “medical suspense queen.”

Her series featuring homicide detective Jane Rizzoli and medical examiner Maura Isles inspired the TNT television series Rizzoli & Isles, starring Angie Harmon and Sasha Alexander.

Now retired from medicine, she lives in Maine and writes full time.

“This is a nice take on retirement―five old spooks whose bones may ache but whose minds remain sharp. You can expect mystery, action, and bloodshed in this exciting thriller launched straight from the peaceful shores of Maine.” ―Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

“The plot bustles along nicely, careening from Thailand to Italy and many points in between, but the real surprise is the richness of Gerritsen’s supporting cast, a cantankerous bunch whose love for one another runs deep.” ―Publishers Weekly

“Gerritsen…branches out into the world of espionage…expertly mixing spy drama with romance and wry comedy… Gerritsen fans and readers of Richard Osman’s Thursday Murder Club mysteries will love this.” ―Booklist (starred review)

“Tess Gerritsen delivers a thrilling, endearing read.” ―Seattle Book Review

“Tess Gerritsen writes in a smoothly elegant style; it’s always a delight to read her. The Spy Coast is a marvelously plotted read with action-packed pages, g-force twists and turns, and a platoon of fascinating characters. I truly hope to see Maggie Bird and her team of silver-haired helpers on the pages again.” ―David Baldacci, #1 New York Times bestselling author

“Master storyteller Tess Gerritsen has written an ingenious, spellbinding novel that moves from Bangkok to a small town in Maine, seductive settings where secrets are kept and lives upended…The Spy Coast is utterly thrilling, full of morally complex characters with deeply buried secrets and a life-and-death chase into the past and back again. It’s a great novel.” ―Luanne Rice, New York Times bestselling author

“Powerful, resonant, absorbing, freighted with menace and suspense…Gerritsen is a born storyteller, and this new series showcases her talents more than ever. Irresistible and highly recommended!” ―Lee Child, #1 New York Times bestselling author

“A riveting tale filled with engaging characters. I look forward to the rest of the series.” ―Kathy Reichs, author of the Temperance Brennan Bones series

“Tess Gerritsen is a brilliant, must-read novelist, and she’s done it again with The Spy Coast. Readers will want to follow the adventures of Maggie Bird and her band of Mainer compatriots for a long, long time.” ―C. J. Box, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Storm Watch

“A crackerjack thriller.” ―Paul Doiron, bestselling author of the Mike Bowditch novels

“I loved it. A hugely entertaining read!” ―Ann Cleeves, creator of the Vera and Shetland series

The Spy Coast by Tess Gerritsen is a twisty, character-driven thriller that blends espionage, small-town life, and the lingering cost of secrets. The story centers on Maggie Bird, a quiet woman in her sixties living in the coastal town of Purity, Maine. On the surface, Maggie seems like any other retired local, tending to her chickens and trying to live a peaceful, anonymous life. But Maggie and a handful of her neighbors carry a hidden past: they were once CIA operatives, people who lived in shadows, lied for a living, and made choices that still haunt them. Maggie has tried hard to leave that world behind, but the past arrives on her doorstep one night in the most shocking way—when a young woman shows up, terrified and bleeding, and then ends up dead on Maggie’s property.

That violent event shatters the calm of Purity and forces Maggie to confront what she fears most: someone knows who she is and what she did, and they’ve come looking for her. The local police chief, Jo Thibodeau, a competent and determined officer who has always suspected something unusual about Maggie, now has a murder investigation on her hands. Jo is used to dealing with small-town issues—domestic disputes, petty crime, tourists—so finding a dead woman linked to a quiet retiree raises her suspicions. Maggie, however, knows this isn’t random. She recognizes signs that point to her former life and to an operation that went disastrously wrong decades ago, an operation that still weighs heavily on her conscience.

As danger closes in, Maggie reaches out to the only people she can truly trust: her old CIA colleagues, who also live “retired” lives nearby. They are part of an informal group jokingly called “The Martini Club,” older former spies who meet for drinks and banter, but beneath the warmth and humor, they remain sharp and capable. There’s Liddy, Declan, and others, each with their own specialties and scars. Together, they decide to dig into what’s really happening rather than leave it in Jo’s hands alone. It’s not that they don’t trust Jo as a person, but they know that official channels may not be enough to stop a threat that understands espionage and is willing to kill. Their decision pulls them back into the mindset they thought they’d left behind: assessing threats, running surveillance, considering traps and double-crosses.

The heart of the mystery lies in a botched mission from Maggie’s past. Years ago, she was involved in an operation overseas that ended with tragedy, betrayal, and unanswered questions. She has carried guilt and doubt ever since, unsure who truly betrayed whom and what was real in a world built on lies. That mission involved a child, a family, and a target who never fully disappeared into history. When the young woman appears at her door and then dies, it becomes increasingly clear to Maggie that someone connected to that old mission is seeking revenge—or closure. The story moves back and forth between Maggie’s present in Purity and glimpses of her life as a younger operative, showing the intense training, the moral compromises, and the emotional shutdown required to function as a spy.

Jo Thibodeau, meanwhile, is determined to do her job, even as she finds herself out of her depth. She starts with basic police work—identifying the victim, tracing her movements, checking Maggie’s background—but quickly realizes the victim was not just some stranger passing through. There are too many inconsistencies, too many signs that this is bigger than a simple homicide. Jo senses that Maggie is hiding something important, and the tension between them gives the book much of its emotional charge. Jo wants the truth for professional reasons and for her community’s safety; Maggie wants to protect Jo from a world where truth can be deadly. Over time, Jo has to decide whether she can trust Maggie and her “friends,” even as she’s alarmed by how skilled they are at lying, gathering information, and quietly bending rules.

The retired spies bring both humor and gravity to the story. They joke about age and aches, but when danger appears, their old instincts return effortlessly. They set watches, analyze motives, and quietly arm themselves. Tess Gerritsen uses them to explore what happens when people who have spent their lives in a high-stakes world try to age peacefully, only to be dragged back into violence. Their loyalty to Maggie is genuine, but not blind; they know that every one of them, including her, has made mistakes and kept secrets. As they investigate, they uncover layers of deception involving intelligence agencies, foreign actors, and long-buried files that some would kill to keep hidden.

As the story unfolds, Maggie must face not only external threats but also her own emotional past. She has spent years cultivating distance—few close friends, no romantic entanglements, a quiet life with routines that keep her mind from straying too far into memory. The appearance of the dead woman cracks that armor: she is forced to remember the mission, the people she lost, and the choices she made under orders. She questions whether what she did was truly for her country’s safety or just part of a system that used her and then abandoned her. This personal reckoning gives the thriller a strong emotional core, making Maggie feel like more than a standard tough ex-spy; she is a woman who has carried heavy burdens into old age and now has to decide what kind of person she will be in her final chapters.

The plot moves through twists as more pieces of the old operation come to light and the violence escalates. There are confrontations that reveal new truths about who betrayed whom and why, moments where Maggie and her friends must improvise under pressure, and attempts on lives that make it clear someone is willing to remove any loose end. Jo finds herself caught between official procedures and the messy reality of covert history. She has to collaborate with people she doesn’t fully understand, and she struggles with the idea that patriotism can look very different from the ground than it does on paper. Through Jo’s eyes, the reader sees how frightening it is to realize your peaceful town has been quietly hosting a cluster of people trained to lie, kill, and disappear.

By the end of The Spy Coast, the truth about the old mission finally surfaces, and the connections between the dead woman, Maggie’s past, and the current threat are revealed. The resolution involves not just catching a killer or stopping a plot, but confronting the emotional fallout of careers built on secrecy. Maggie gains a measure of closure, though not without loss and painful honesty. The “Martini Club” proves that age has not erased their skills or their capacity for courage, but it has made them more conscious of what violence costs. Jo emerges with a deeper, more complicated view of law, justice, and national security, and with a grudging respect for Maggie and her friends. The book closes with the sense that while danger may have passed for now, the shadows of espionage never fully disappear; they linger at the edges of even the quietest lives, carried by the people who once lived in them and still dream of simple peace they may never completely attain.