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Deleting Five Man Band ZCE tree as per cleanup requirement. Hiding many ZCEs.
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* AntiHero: Wells, type II or type III.
* AntiVillain: Duto.
* AntiVillain: Duto.
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* TheChessmaster: Khadri in Faithful Spy, Li in Ghost War, Nasiji in Silent Man, [[spoiler: Duto]] in Midnight House, Saeed in Secret Soldier, [[spoiler: Lautner]] in Shadow Patrol.
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* ColdSniper: Francesca.
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* CoolOldGuy: Shafer.
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* KnightInSourArmor: Wells.
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* LawyerFriendlyCameo: Averted in the Secret Soldier. Abdullah, the king of Saudi Arabia, appears as himself and serves as a major character.
* ObstructiveBureaucrat: Fred Whitby in Midnight House.
* OnlySaneMan: Shafer.
* PlatonicLifePartners: Exley and Shafer. Though at Midnight House, Wells suspects something deeper. Shafer privately confirms it in Shadow Patrol.
%%* PluckyComicRelief: Shafer.
%%* FiveManBand:
%%** TheHero: Wells
%%** TheLancer, TheFunnyGuy: Shafer
%%** TheChick: Exley
%%** The Smart Guy: Shafer and Exley alternate.
%%* ReplacementGoldfish: Anne, [[spoiler: after Exley leaves Wells at the end of Silent Man]].
* ObstructiveBureaucrat: Fred Whitby in Midnight House.
* OnlySaneMan: Shafer.
* PlatonicLifePartners: Exley and Shafer. Though at Midnight House, Wells suspects something deeper. Shafer privately confirms it in Shadow Patrol.
%%* PluckyComicRelief: Shafer.
%%* FiveManBand:
%%** TheHero: Wells
%%** TheLancer, TheFunnyGuy: Shafer
%%** TheChick: Exley
%%** The Smart Guy: Shafer and Exley alternate.
%%* ReplacementGoldfish: Anne, [[spoiler: after Exley leaves Wells at the end of Silent Man]].
to:
%%** TheHero: Wells
%%** TheLancer, TheFunnyGuy: Shafer
%%** TheChick: Exley
%%** The Smart Guy: Shafer and Exley alternate.
%%* ReplacementGoldfish:
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* ShellShockedVeteran: Poor Wells.
* ShownTheirWork
* ShownTheirWork
to:
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* UpToEleven: Berenson is as nice to Wells as Creator/JossWhedon to Buffy. Just how much mental torture Wells has to pass through? Being infected by the plague? Tortured by Chinese prison guards? [[spoiler: Left by his fiance?]] [[spoiler: Played by his boss?]] Shooting an incapacitated enemy in the back? [[spoiler: Having to kill fellow Americans?]]
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Not So Different has been renamed, and it needs to be dewicked/moved
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* NotSoDifferent: Francesca screams this to Wells as they are fighting. But Wells knows better.
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* NotSoDifferent: NotSoDifferentRemark: Francesca screams this to Wells as they are fighting. But Wells knows better.
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* GenreDeconstruction: Subtly, about Wells and Exley's relationship. In the Faithful Spy, their attachment resembles Romeo and Juliet's, and in the end they do get together. But in subsequent books, now that they move in and live together, they have to deal with each other's strength and weakness.
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* RealityEnsues: Subtly, about Wells and Exley's relationship. In the Faithful Spy, their attachment resembles Romeo and Juliet's, and in the end they do get together. But in subsequent books, now that they move in and live together, they have to deal with each other's strength and weakness.
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* PluckyComicRelief: Shafer.
* PowerTrio:
** TheHero: Wells
** TheLancer, TheFunnyGuy: Shafer
** TheChick: Exley
** The Smart Guy: Shafer and Exley alternate.
* PowerTrio:
** TheHero: Wells
** TheLancer, TheFunnyGuy: Shafer
** TheChick: Exley
** The Smart Guy: Shafer and Exley alternate.
to:
**
%%** TheHero: Wells
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Not a trope.
* AntagonistTitle: The Shadow Patrol. It refers to a sniper duet that goes rogue in Afghanistan, Wells' ultimate enemy in the eponymous book.
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* [[AntagonistTitle Villain Title]]: The Shadow Patrol. It refers to a sniper duet that goes rogue in Afghanistan, Wells' ultimate enemy in the eponymous book.
* WarOnTerror
* WarOnTerror
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* ReplacementLoveInterest: Anne, [[spoiler: after Exley leaves Wells at the end of Silent Man]].
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* IndecisiveDeconstruction: Berenson plays SpyFiction tropes straight as much as he subverts them.
** Unlike other ultra-patriot killers, Wells is not an assassin. He feels remorse when he kills those he has no problem with, and he always remember the people he kills. Only one caveat: he keeps killing anyway. It's part of his business.
** Unlike other super-charming spies, Wells is not a womanizer. He is attached to one woman only, never takes up one-night stands, and feels genuine regret when his significant others chose to leave him. Only one caveat: Women still love him. He's just so handsome.
** Unlike other ObstructiveBureaucrat, Duto is not one-dimensional. He protects people who protects his position. He has been kidnapped in the field and shrugged it off as easily as real soldiers might. Only one caveat: He's still arrogant, and you still can't trust him.
** Unlike other ultra-patriot killers, Wells is not an assassin. He feels remorse when he kills those he has no problem with, and he always remember the people he kills. Only one caveat: he keeps killing anyway. It's part of his business.
** Unlike other super-charming spies, Wells is not a womanizer. He is attached to one woman only, never takes up one-night stands, and feels genuine regret when his significant others chose to leave him. Only one caveat: Women still love him. He's just so handsome.
** Unlike other ObstructiveBureaucrat, Duto is not one-dimensional. He protects people who protects his position. He has been kidnapped in the field and shrugged it off as easily as real soldiers might. Only one caveat: He's still arrogant, and you still can't trust him.
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A spy novel series by Alex Berenson. The series is led by John Wells, a legendary {{CIA}} hero. So far there are six books available, with at least two more books on the way.
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A spy novel series by Alex Berenson. The series is led by John Wells, a legendary {{CIA}} UsefulNotes/{{CIA}} hero. So far there are six books available, with at least two more books on the way.
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Useful Notes/ pages are not tropes
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* TheNewRussia: a chapter in Silent Man. Wells despises it so much that, if the choices are between nightclubs of Moscow or piss-poor mountains of Afghanistan, he'll return to Afghanistan.
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* OsamaBinLaden: Wells met him. Twice. The only CIA agent ever does so.
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* {{Badass}}: Seriously, you need to ask?
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Merging with Villain Has A Point, cleaning up questionable examples.
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* HannibalHasAPoint: Amadullah is a stone-cold Taliban guerilla leader who moonlights as drug dealer. At the same time, he is tired of having foreigners making his homeland a battlefield of their own business. If Americans just leave, he and his fellow Pashtuns will make sure that al-Qaeda can never return to Afghanistan. Too bad Americans don't understand.
--> '''Amadullah''': They didn’t belong in his country any more than he belonged in America.
--> '''Amadullah''': They didn’t belong in his country any more than he belonged in America.
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None
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* BecauseImGoodAtIt: Wells has come to realize that, no matter how hard he tries, he'll never quit spy.
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* BecauseImGoodAtIt: Wells has come to realize that, no matter how hard he tries, he'll never quit spy. Even when he tries to have a relationship, when his lover asks him to pick her or the job, he picks the job.
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* CharacterDevelopment: Duto. In Faithful Spy, he's a complete JerkAss DaChief that steals people's credit and stands no disapproval from below. Six books later, he is a fully-developed TheChessmaster politician who is on his way to take the White House.
to:
* CharacterDevelopment: Duto. In Faithful Spy, he's a complete JerkAss DaChief that steals people's credit and stands no disapproval from below. Six Eight books later, he is a fully-developed TheChessmaster politician who is on his way to take the White House.House.
** By book 8 and 9, he also opens up to Wells a bit and even attempts to give a well meaning deconstruction of Wells inability to reconcile his desire for a normal life with his ChronicHeroSyndrome, telling him to accept who he is and be at peace with the fact.
** By book 8 and 9, he also opens up to Wells a bit and even attempts to give a well meaning deconstruction of Wells inability to reconcile his desire for a normal life with his ChronicHeroSyndrome, telling him to accept who he is and be at peace with the fact.
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** Deconstructed to a degree. Because of this, Wells can't hold down a relationship with his lovers or son and is in denial about it to a great extent. This is seen when Anne throws him out of her house at the end of The Counterfeit Agent and immediately shoots him down when he tries to apologize and reassure her that he'll eventually quit.
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** In book 9, he gets to show off his combat training, saving Wells during his attack on the antagonist's safe house with the smooth use of a Remington 870.
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Misuse
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** The Midnight House
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** The Night Ranger
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** The Faithful Spy
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** The Silent Man
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** The Secret Soldier
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* Badass: Seriously, you need to ask?
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* Badass: {{Badass}}: Seriously, you need to ask?
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A spy novel series by Alex Berenson. The series is led by John Wells, a legendary {{CIA}} hero. So far there are six books available, with at least two more books on the way.
----
!!Provides Examples Of:
* AntiHero: Wells, type II or type III.
* AntiVillain: Duto.
* Badass: Seriously, you need to ask?
* BecauseImGoodAtIt: Wells has come to realize that, no matter how hard he tries, he'll never quit spy.
* BlackComedy: Berenson sprinkles it here and there, partly to heighten the tension, partly make the characters' GallowsHumor and DeadpanSnarker work.
* BloodKnight: Wells relish in whites-in-the-eyes fight...because it's the only time he feels alive.
* CharacterDevelopment: Duto. In Faithful Spy, he's a complete JerkAss DaChief that steals people's credit and stands no disapproval from below. Six books later, he is a fully-developed TheChessmaster politician who is on his way to take the White House.
* CharacterShilling: Exley.
* ChekhovsGun: in the Silent Man, Wells found a Nittany Lion mug on a jihadi financier. [[spoiler: Turns out the bad guys have a final stopover in an apartment of a Penn State student.]]
* TheChessmaster: Khadri in Faithful Spy, Li in Ghost War, Nasiji in Silent Man, [[spoiler: Duto]] in Midnight House, Saeed in Secret Soldier, [[spoiler: Lautner]] in Shadow Patrol.
* ChronicHeroSyndrome: Wells has a case. PlayedForDrama once, when Exley calls him out about it. It doesn't work. [[spoiler: So she leaves him.]]
* CloudCuckooLander: Shafer acts this way, though he is unquestionably the best analyst in CIA. Whether he's that weird or he wants to mythify himself is beyond everyone.
** Deconstructed supremely dark in form of Mohammed Fariz, an inmate of the Midnight House. Both his fellow jihadi inmate and American prison interrogators consider him to be crazy, and so no one pays attention to what he's doing. [[spoiler: He ends up cutting his inmate to eighty-five bits and then slashing his own neck. The bleeding is so bad that the interrogators need waders to get in.]]
* ColdSniper: Francesca.
* ContrivedCoincidence: In Shadow Patrol, it just happens that Talib warlord Amadullah Thuwani's half-brother is Miteb, a Saudi prince whom Wells worked for in Secret Soldier. But better that than AssPull character.
* CoolOldGuy: Shafer.
* CowboyCop: More like cowboy agent. Wells is more used to work alone by his rules.
* DaChief: Duto hates Wells because Wells stands up to him, though he still recognizes Wells' importance.
* DaddyHadAGoodReasonForAbandoningYou: Wells left his son, Evan, from his first marriage because he's going undercover to Al Qaeda.
** Deconstructed heavily in Shadow Patrol. For Evan, Wells is as good as a sperm donor. He has considered his stepfather, Howard, as his real father.
--> '''Evan''': I have two real parents. I couldn’t miss you any less.
* DarkerAndEdgier: Compared to other spy fictions, this series is really dark, not because of its violence scenes, but rather its characters' depth.
** Midnight House and Shadow Patrol are especially dark.
* DeadpanSnarker: ''Everyone'' has his moments. Yes, truly.
--> ''A CIA team is preparing for an extraction mission to North Korea:''
--> '''Kang''' (preparing a satellite image of North Korea): And that's North Korea. Dead as a whatever.
--> '''Beck''': The good citizens of the Democratic People's Republic don't need the corruption of the outside world.
--> '''Kang''': Yeah. Like food.
* TheDeterminator: Wells. Most notably in Faithful Spy, where he's [[spoiler: infected with plague]], and in the Ghost War, where he's [[spoiler: tortured in Chinese prison]].
* DownerEnding: The end of Midnight House. [[spoiler: Wells has been made a fool by Vinny Duto so badly that he quits CIA.]]
* TheDragon: Yusuf to Nasiji, Francesca to [[spoiler: Lautner]].
* DrivenToSuicide: [[spoiler: Rachel Callar. The moment she saw what Mohammed Fariz had done and become because of the Midnight House, she breaks.]]
* DrivingQuestion: What happened in the Midnight House? And who is Stan in Shadow Patrol?
* EarnYourHappyEnding: The Faithful Spy ''runs'' on this trope. For ten years, Wells lives undercover in the backwater of Afghanistan. When he returns to America, his mother was dead, his wife remarried, and his son doesn't know him. He couldn't adjust, his faith in Islam wears off, and his closest confidant Exley is trapped by her job. Even worse, neither CIA, who suspects him a traitor, nor Al Qaeda, who suspects him an infidel, trusts him. And then he gets infected with '''plague'''...But in the end, everything's worth it for Wells, for when ''he opens his eyes, there she is''.
* EnhancedInterrogationTechniques: The Midnight House.
* EvilLaugh: Or more exactly, a high-pitched hyena-like giggle. Francesca's.
* FaceHeelTurn: Duto-led CIA suspects Wells of this in Faithful Spy.
** [[spoiler: Lautner in Shadow Patrol.]]
* {{Foreshadowing}}: in Midnight House, Shafer jokes that [[spoiler: Eddie, the mole in Ghost War and a CIA fugitive]] will betray himself by sending a postcard to his wife. [[spoiler: Exactly what happens in Secret Soldier]].
* GallowsHumor: Justified. Berenson's characters are spies and soldiers. They cope with the stress of their job by making fun of it. Mostly summed up by this gem:
--> ''American soldiers get out of armored personnel carrier, arrive at a backwater village in Afghanistan:''
--> '''Young''': Back to reality.
--> '''Fowler''': This is reality?
--> '''Young''': I hope not.
* TheGreatestStoryNeverTold: save for Times Square in Faithful Spy, the rest of Wells' adventure remains secret.
** Most notably in Faithful Spy. Bin Laden asks Wells whether Hoover Dam is a great symbol of America. Wells says no. Nobody, not even Wells, knows how much credit he deserves for the fact that Hoover Dam is still in one piece.
** This bites Wells in the ass in Midnight House. Fred Whitby threatens to reveal Wells' murders in Moscow in order to stop Wells' private investigation. When Wells fires back by taking credit for [[spoiler: saving Washington DC from nuclear weapon in Silent Man]], Whitby says Wells cannot reveal it without creating national hysteria.
* HannibalHasAPoint: Amadullah is a stone-cold Taliban guerilla leader who moonlights as drug dealer. At the same time, he is tired of having foreigners making his homeland a battlefield of their own business. If Americans just leave, he and his fellow Pashtuns will make sure that al-Qaeda can never return to Afghanistan. Too bad Americans don't understand.
--> '''Amadullah''': They didn’t belong in his country any more than he belonged in America.
* HeWhoFightsMonsters: The only thing Wells dreads.
** Francesca in Shadow Patrol has become one.
* HeroOfAnotherStory:
** Once upon a time, Shafer saved Rosette from Mobutu, dictator of Zaire. Wells can't imagine Shafer beyond Washington suburb.
** Duto, too. He was once a case officer in Colombia, where he'd been abducted by leftist rebels.
* HiddenDepths:
** Kowalski. He is an amoral man who profits from dealing weapons to all sides in a war, but as shown in Silent Man and Secret Soldier, he does the right thing sometimes. In Silent Man, [[spoiler: he give Wells a name of a terrorist nuclear network because he can't stand seeing cities like NYC gone for some religious tales.]] In Secret Soldier, [[spoiler: he connects Wells with Abdullah, a moderate king of Saudi Arabia whom he regards better than the rest of the royals.]]
** Duto. True, he's a full-blown JerkAss DaChief, ObstructiveBureaucrat borderline [[CorruptBureaucrat corrupt]], and most of all, an [[ItsAllAboutMe egoistic power-seeker]] who [[NeverMyFault refuses to take blame for any mistake CIA makes]]. [[spoiler: But the BatmanGambit he pulls off on Wells and Shafer in Midnight House exemplifies why it's not wise to cross on this man.]] Also, in Shadow Patrol, it's revealed that Duto had once suffered a two-month abduction in Colombia, shrugged it off in two weeks of Caribbean vacation, and then returned to the same station. Nobody had ever accused him of being afraid.
* HidingBehindReligion: What Wells thinks of Al Qaeda.
* IndecisiveDeconstruction: Berenson plays SpyFiction tropes straight as much as he subverts them.
** Unlike other ultra-patriot killers, Wells is not an assassin. He feels remorse when he kills those he has no problem with, and he always remember the people he kills. Only one caveat: he keeps killing anyway. It's part of his business.
** Unlike other super-charming spies, Wells is not a womanizer. He is attached to one woman only, never takes up one-night stands, and feels genuine regret when his significant others chose to leave him. Only one caveat: Women still love him. He's just so handsome.
** Unlike other ObstructiveBureaucrat, Duto is not one-dimensional. He protects people who protects his position. He has been kidnapped in the field and shrugged it off as easily as real soldiers might. Only one caveat: He's still arrogant, and you still can't trust him.
* HonorBeforeReason: Coleman Young would die sooner than let Fowler's death go unavenged.
* IdiotBall: Hardly anyone in the series. Most of the characters are sensible and third-dimensional.
* InternalAffairs: Shadow Patrol's plot. Who's the traitor in CIA Kabul station?
* InterserviceRivalry: CIA versus Office of Director of National Intelligence in Midnight House. [[spoiler: CIA wins]].
* ItGetsEasier: played with. Wells has no compunction killing terrorists, but he is no assassin. He never forgets anyone he kills, and he can't pretend all of them are his enemies.
* ItSeemedLikeAGoodIdeaAtTheTime: Wells duct-tapes Kowalski's head in Ghost War. For that, [[spoiler: Kowalski tries to assassinate him and Exley in Silent Man, the next book.]] DisproportionateRetribution can't even begin to describe Kowalski's attempt to get even.
* ItsPersonal: [[DeconstructedTrope Deconstructed]] in the first arc of the Silent Man. After an attack on him leaves Exley severely wounded, Wells goes to Russia alone to take on one of the masterminds behind the attack, ignoring the advice from his ObstructiveBureaucrat boss Duto to wait for evidence. In a stock spy novel he would have succeeded. [[spoiler: He ends up killing pawns who got nothing to do with the attack, missing the real mastermind, and needing to apologize to Duto to avoid prosecution.]]
* JurisdictionFriction: again, Midnight House, CIA versus ODNI. CIA wants the truth of Midnight House comes out and ODNI doesn't.
* KarmaHoudini: Kowalski and Saeed.
* KnightInSourArmor: Wells.
* LongGame:
** Khadri's plan in Faithful Spy. [[spoiler: by car bombing Los Angeles and assassinating an ex-Pentagon top dog, he attempts to occupy CIA as long as he can until he can launch his two-pronged master plan: dirty-bombing Times Square and then plague-spreading New York subways]].
** [[spoiler: Lautner's]] plan in Shadow Patrol. [[spoiler: by dealing drugs with Talib warlord, he attempts to build his cred high enough so the Talib warlord agrees to have a private meeting with him, where he gives the warlord SAM to shoot down CIA plane.]]
* LoveMakesYouEvil: [[spoiler: Steve Callar and Peter Lautner.]]
* MadLibThrillerTitle:
** The Faithful Spy
** The Ghost War
** The Silent Man
** The Midnight House
** The Secret Soldier
** The Shadow Patrol
** The Night Ranger
* MarriedToTheJob: Wells. His first marriage and [[spoiler: his engagement with Exley]] end because of this.
* MemeticBadass: In-universe, in the aftermath of Faithful Spy. Though realistically, by fourth book it fades away. By sixth book, nobody recalls Wells on the top of his head.
* TheMole: a subplot in Ghost War, a major plot in Shadow Patrol.
* Nakama: Wells, Exley, and Shafer. Duto even [[LampshadeHanging lampshades]] this, calling them the Three Musketeers with us-against-the-world thing. [[spoiler: Exley's out by the end of Silent Man, Wells quits CIA by the end of Midnight House]].
* TheNewRussia: a chapter in Silent Man. Wells despises it so much that, if the choices are between nightclubs of Moscow or piss-poor mountains of Afghanistan, he'll return to Afghanistan.
* NiceJobBreakingItHero: by killing government-affiliated mercenaries in Russia, Wells makes it impossible for the CIA to [[spoiler: investigate the attack on him and Exley.]]
* NoodleIncident: In-universe. Just exactly what happened in the Midnight House?
* NotSoDifferent: Francesca screams this to Wells as they are fighting. But Wells knows better.
--> '''Francesca''': You think you're any different than me, John? That what you think?
--> ''Yeah, somewhere on the way, you stopped caring who you killed.''
* LawyerFriendlyCameo: Averted in the Secret Soldier. Abdullah, the king of Saudi Arabia, appears as himself and serves as a major character.
* ObstructiveBureaucrat: Fred Whitby in Midnight House.
* OnlySaneMan: Shafer.
* OsamaBinLaden: Wells met him. Twice. The only CIA agent ever does so.
* PlatonicLifePartners: Exley and Shafer. Though at Midnight House, Wells suspects something deeper. Shafer privately confirms it in Shadow Patrol.
* PluckyComicRelief: Shafer.
* PowerTrio:
** TheHero: Wells
** TheLancer, TheFunnyGuy: Shafer
** TheChick: Exley
** The Smart Guy: Shafer and Exley alternate.
* RealityEnsues: Subtly, about Wells and Exley's relationship. In the Faithful Spy, their attachment resembles Romeo and Juliet's, and in the end they do get together. But in subsequent books, now that they move in and live together, they have to deal with each other's strength and weakness.
* ReplacementLoveInterest: Anne, [[spoiler: after Exley leaves Wells at the end of Silent Man]].
* RoaringRampageofRevenge:
** Wells, when [[spoiler: Kowalski tries to assassinate him and his girlfriend]] in Silent Man.
** [[spoiler: Steve Callar]] in Midnight House.
* RomanceEnsues: Wells and Exley at their DC trip in Faithful Spy.
* SaidBookism: Averted with a vengeance. Berenson's such a good author that his dialogue speaks all it needs to speak.
* SaudiArabia: the setting of Secret Soldier.
* ScrewTheRulesImDoingWhatsRight:
** Li wants to save China by ignoring all sensible diplomacy with the United States.
** Wells goes to Moscow to hunt those behind the attempt on him and Exley. He is convinced that Kremlin won't surrender them and CIA won't pursue further. [[spoiler: He fails.]]
* ShellShockedVeteran: Poor Wells.
* ShownTheirWork
* SpannerInTheWorks:
** [[spoiler: Cao]] in Ghost War.
** [[spoiler: Bashir]] in Silent Man. [[spoiler: But he failed]].
** [[spoiler: Mohammed Fariz]] in the Midnight House.
* StartOfDarkness: [[spoiler: Lautner's wife and brother were]] killed by Al Qaeda triple agent. CIA, specially Duto, refused to own that up. That prompts [[spoiler: Lautner]] into his FaceHeelTurn.
* StateSec: Chinese MSS in Ghost War, Egyptian mukhabarat and Pakistani ISI in Midnight House, Saudi muk in Secret Soldier.
* SequelHook
** In Silent Man, Wells makes a coin flip: heads, he kills Kowalski; tails, he sees Evan. [[spoiler: Subverted. The Midnight House reveals he ends up backpacking to Asia.]]
** In Midnight House, Duto tells Wells that Wells will eventually be back for the CIA. [[spoiler: Wells doesn't.]]
** In Secret Soldier, Wells feels that his beef with Saeed isn't over.
** In Shadow Patrol, Amadullah still has anti-aircraft missiles. And one day he will use them.
* TheStoic: Wells.
* SupportingProtagonist: ''The Silent Man'' is overloaded with these. You have Grigory, a scientist who helps with the warhead theft; Bashir, an doctor who transforms the warhead into a working nuclear bomb; Kowalski, an arms dealer who tries to stop his feud with Wells by selling out a jihadi involved on the warhead theft; and Wells, who would never have heard of the nuclear plot if Kowalski hadn't tried to assassinate him and his girlfriend. The real protagonist of the book? It's Sayyid Nasiji, the VillainProtagonist.
* TortureAlwaysWorks: Deconstructed heavily in Midnight House. It works, but at what cost?
* TortureCellar: the eponymous Midnight House.
* UltimateJobSecurity: Zig-zagged. After the Faithful Spy, Duto rewards Wells and Exley and Shafer his CIA director-level credentials, but puts them outside official chain-of-command of Langley. This means that our trio have blank check on whatever work they do, but one mistake and they are fired.
* UpToEleven: Berenson is as nice to Wells as Creator/JossWhedon to Buffy. Just how much mental torture Wells has to pass through? Being infected by the plague? Tortured by Chinese prison guards? [[spoiler: Left by his fiance?]] [[spoiler: Played by his boss?]] Shooting an incapacitated enemy in the back? [[spoiler: Having to kill fellow Americans?]]
* VillainProtagonist: Sayyid Nasiji in ''The Silent Man''. The whole novel revolves around his plot to nuke America. [[spoiler: Of course, he fails.]]
* [[AntagonistTitle Villain Title]]: The Shadow Patrol. It refers to a sniper duet that goes rogue in Afghanistan, Wells' ultimate enemy in the eponymous book.
* WarOnTerror
* WellIntentionedExtremist: Li wants to purge corrupt ministers in Chinese leadership so Chinese nation can achieve greater prosperity. Only one problem: [[spoiler: he does so by pushing China to war with America]]
* WhatExactlyIsHisJob: In a pleasant twist, Wells asks this to himself. After the Faithful Spy, there isn't much he could do in CIA. Sure, he saves America once every year so far, but he doesn't have a daily job.
* WhatTheHellHero: Wells gets so many in Silent Man. From Rosette, Shafer, Duto, Kowalski, and Exley.
* WorldHalfFull: Wells has issues with his faith, relationship, and politics. And yet he still trusts that what he's doing is right.
----
!!Provides Examples Of:
* AntiHero: Wells, type II or type III.
* AntiVillain: Duto.
* Badass: Seriously, you need to ask?
* BecauseImGoodAtIt: Wells has come to realize that, no matter how hard he tries, he'll never quit spy.
* BlackComedy: Berenson sprinkles it here and there, partly to heighten the tension, partly make the characters' GallowsHumor and DeadpanSnarker work.
* BloodKnight: Wells relish in whites-in-the-eyes fight...because it's the only time he feels alive.
* CharacterDevelopment: Duto. In Faithful Spy, he's a complete JerkAss DaChief that steals people's credit and stands no disapproval from below. Six books later, he is a fully-developed TheChessmaster politician who is on his way to take the White House.
* CharacterShilling: Exley.
* ChekhovsGun: in the Silent Man, Wells found a Nittany Lion mug on a jihadi financier. [[spoiler: Turns out the bad guys have a final stopover in an apartment of a Penn State student.]]
* TheChessmaster: Khadri in Faithful Spy, Li in Ghost War, Nasiji in Silent Man, [[spoiler: Duto]] in Midnight House, Saeed in Secret Soldier, [[spoiler: Lautner]] in Shadow Patrol.
* ChronicHeroSyndrome: Wells has a case. PlayedForDrama once, when Exley calls him out about it. It doesn't work. [[spoiler: So she leaves him.]]
* CloudCuckooLander: Shafer acts this way, though he is unquestionably the best analyst in CIA. Whether he's that weird or he wants to mythify himself is beyond everyone.
** Deconstructed supremely dark in form of Mohammed Fariz, an inmate of the Midnight House. Both his fellow jihadi inmate and American prison interrogators consider him to be crazy, and so no one pays attention to what he's doing. [[spoiler: He ends up cutting his inmate to eighty-five bits and then slashing his own neck. The bleeding is so bad that the interrogators need waders to get in.]]
* ColdSniper: Francesca.
* ContrivedCoincidence: In Shadow Patrol, it just happens that Talib warlord Amadullah Thuwani's half-brother is Miteb, a Saudi prince whom Wells worked for in Secret Soldier. But better that than AssPull character.
* CoolOldGuy: Shafer.
* CowboyCop: More like cowboy agent. Wells is more used to work alone by his rules.
* DaChief: Duto hates Wells because Wells stands up to him, though he still recognizes Wells' importance.
* DaddyHadAGoodReasonForAbandoningYou: Wells left his son, Evan, from his first marriage because he's going undercover to Al Qaeda.
** Deconstructed heavily in Shadow Patrol. For Evan, Wells is as good as a sperm donor. He has considered his stepfather, Howard, as his real father.
--> '''Evan''': I have two real parents. I couldn’t miss you any less.
* DarkerAndEdgier: Compared to other spy fictions, this series is really dark, not because of its violence scenes, but rather its characters' depth.
** Midnight House and Shadow Patrol are especially dark.
* DeadpanSnarker: ''Everyone'' has his moments. Yes, truly.
--> ''A CIA team is preparing for an extraction mission to North Korea:''
--> '''Kang''' (preparing a satellite image of North Korea): And that's North Korea. Dead as a whatever.
--> '''Beck''': The good citizens of the Democratic People's Republic don't need the corruption of the outside world.
--> '''Kang''': Yeah. Like food.
* TheDeterminator: Wells. Most notably in Faithful Spy, where he's [[spoiler: infected with plague]], and in the Ghost War, where he's [[spoiler: tortured in Chinese prison]].
* DownerEnding: The end of Midnight House. [[spoiler: Wells has been made a fool by Vinny Duto so badly that he quits CIA.]]
* TheDragon: Yusuf to Nasiji, Francesca to [[spoiler: Lautner]].
* DrivenToSuicide: [[spoiler: Rachel Callar. The moment she saw what Mohammed Fariz had done and become because of the Midnight House, she breaks.]]
* DrivingQuestion: What happened in the Midnight House? And who is Stan in Shadow Patrol?
* EarnYourHappyEnding: The Faithful Spy ''runs'' on this trope. For ten years, Wells lives undercover in the backwater of Afghanistan. When he returns to America, his mother was dead, his wife remarried, and his son doesn't know him. He couldn't adjust, his faith in Islam wears off, and his closest confidant Exley is trapped by her job. Even worse, neither CIA, who suspects him a traitor, nor Al Qaeda, who suspects him an infidel, trusts him. And then he gets infected with '''plague'''...But in the end, everything's worth it for Wells, for when ''he opens his eyes, there she is''.
* EnhancedInterrogationTechniques: The Midnight House.
* EvilLaugh: Or more exactly, a high-pitched hyena-like giggle. Francesca's.
* FaceHeelTurn: Duto-led CIA suspects Wells of this in Faithful Spy.
** [[spoiler: Lautner in Shadow Patrol.]]
* {{Foreshadowing}}: in Midnight House, Shafer jokes that [[spoiler: Eddie, the mole in Ghost War and a CIA fugitive]] will betray himself by sending a postcard to his wife. [[spoiler: Exactly what happens in Secret Soldier]].
* GallowsHumor: Justified. Berenson's characters are spies and soldiers. They cope with the stress of their job by making fun of it. Mostly summed up by this gem:
--> ''American soldiers get out of armored personnel carrier, arrive at a backwater village in Afghanistan:''
--> '''Young''': Back to reality.
--> '''Fowler''': This is reality?
--> '''Young''': I hope not.
* TheGreatestStoryNeverTold: save for Times Square in Faithful Spy, the rest of Wells' adventure remains secret.
** Most notably in Faithful Spy. Bin Laden asks Wells whether Hoover Dam is a great symbol of America. Wells says no. Nobody, not even Wells, knows how much credit he deserves for the fact that Hoover Dam is still in one piece.
** This bites Wells in the ass in Midnight House. Fred Whitby threatens to reveal Wells' murders in Moscow in order to stop Wells' private investigation. When Wells fires back by taking credit for [[spoiler: saving Washington DC from nuclear weapon in Silent Man]], Whitby says Wells cannot reveal it without creating national hysteria.
* HannibalHasAPoint: Amadullah is a stone-cold Taliban guerilla leader who moonlights as drug dealer. At the same time, he is tired of having foreigners making his homeland a battlefield of their own business. If Americans just leave, he and his fellow Pashtuns will make sure that al-Qaeda can never return to Afghanistan. Too bad Americans don't understand.
--> '''Amadullah''': They didn’t belong in his country any more than he belonged in America.
* HeWhoFightsMonsters: The only thing Wells dreads.
** Francesca in Shadow Patrol has become one.
* HeroOfAnotherStory:
** Once upon a time, Shafer saved Rosette from Mobutu, dictator of Zaire. Wells can't imagine Shafer beyond Washington suburb.
** Duto, too. He was once a case officer in Colombia, where he'd been abducted by leftist rebels.
* HiddenDepths:
** Kowalski. He is an amoral man who profits from dealing weapons to all sides in a war, but as shown in Silent Man and Secret Soldier, he does the right thing sometimes. In Silent Man, [[spoiler: he give Wells a name of a terrorist nuclear network because he can't stand seeing cities like NYC gone for some religious tales.]] In Secret Soldier, [[spoiler: he connects Wells with Abdullah, a moderate king of Saudi Arabia whom he regards better than the rest of the royals.]]
** Duto. True, he's a full-blown JerkAss DaChief, ObstructiveBureaucrat borderline [[CorruptBureaucrat corrupt]], and most of all, an [[ItsAllAboutMe egoistic power-seeker]] who [[NeverMyFault refuses to take blame for any mistake CIA makes]]. [[spoiler: But the BatmanGambit he pulls off on Wells and Shafer in Midnight House exemplifies why it's not wise to cross on this man.]] Also, in Shadow Patrol, it's revealed that Duto had once suffered a two-month abduction in Colombia, shrugged it off in two weeks of Caribbean vacation, and then returned to the same station. Nobody had ever accused him of being afraid.
* HidingBehindReligion: What Wells thinks of Al Qaeda.
* IndecisiveDeconstruction: Berenson plays SpyFiction tropes straight as much as he subverts them.
** Unlike other ultra-patriot killers, Wells is not an assassin. He feels remorse when he kills those he has no problem with, and he always remember the people he kills. Only one caveat: he keeps killing anyway. It's part of his business.
** Unlike other super-charming spies, Wells is not a womanizer. He is attached to one woman only, never takes up one-night stands, and feels genuine regret when his significant others chose to leave him. Only one caveat: Women still love him. He's just so handsome.
** Unlike other ObstructiveBureaucrat, Duto is not one-dimensional. He protects people who protects his position. He has been kidnapped in the field and shrugged it off as easily as real soldiers might. Only one caveat: He's still arrogant, and you still can't trust him.
* HonorBeforeReason: Coleman Young would die sooner than let Fowler's death go unavenged.
* IdiotBall: Hardly anyone in the series. Most of the characters are sensible and third-dimensional.
* InternalAffairs: Shadow Patrol's plot. Who's the traitor in CIA Kabul station?
* InterserviceRivalry: CIA versus Office of Director of National Intelligence in Midnight House. [[spoiler: CIA wins]].
* ItGetsEasier: played with. Wells has no compunction killing terrorists, but he is no assassin. He never forgets anyone he kills, and he can't pretend all of them are his enemies.
* ItSeemedLikeAGoodIdeaAtTheTime: Wells duct-tapes Kowalski's head in Ghost War. For that, [[spoiler: Kowalski tries to assassinate him and Exley in Silent Man, the next book.]] DisproportionateRetribution can't even begin to describe Kowalski's attempt to get even.
* ItsPersonal: [[DeconstructedTrope Deconstructed]] in the first arc of the Silent Man. After an attack on him leaves Exley severely wounded, Wells goes to Russia alone to take on one of the masterminds behind the attack, ignoring the advice from his ObstructiveBureaucrat boss Duto to wait for evidence. In a stock spy novel he would have succeeded. [[spoiler: He ends up killing pawns who got nothing to do with the attack, missing the real mastermind, and needing to apologize to Duto to avoid prosecution.]]
* JurisdictionFriction: again, Midnight House, CIA versus ODNI. CIA wants the truth of Midnight House comes out and ODNI doesn't.
* KarmaHoudini: Kowalski and Saeed.
* KnightInSourArmor: Wells.
* LongGame:
** Khadri's plan in Faithful Spy. [[spoiler: by car bombing Los Angeles and assassinating an ex-Pentagon top dog, he attempts to occupy CIA as long as he can until he can launch his two-pronged master plan: dirty-bombing Times Square and then plague-spreading New York subways]].
** [[spoiler: Lautner's]] plan in Shadow Patrol. [[spoiler: by dealing drugs with Talib warlord, he attempts to build his cred high enough so the Talib warlord agrees to have a private meeting with him, where he gives the warlord SAM to shoot down CIA plane.]]
* LoveMakesYouEvil: [[spoiler: Steve Callar and Peter Lautner.]]
* MadLibThrillerTitle:
** The Faithful Spy
** The Ghost War
** The Silent Man
** The Midnight House
** The Secret Soldier
** The Shadow Patrol
** The Night Ranger
* MarriedToTheJob: Wells. His first marriage and [[spoiler: his engagement with Exley]] end because of this.
* MemeticBadass: In-universe, in the aftermath of Faithful Spy. Though realistically, by fourth book it fades away. By sixth book, nobody recalls Wells on the top of his head.
* TheMole: a subplot in Ghost War, a major plot in Shadow Patrol.
* Nakama: Wells, Exley, and Shafer. Duto even [[LampshadeHanging lampshades]] this, calling them the Three Musketeers with us-against-the-world thing. [[spoiler: Exley's out by the end of Silent Man, Wells quits CIA by the end of Midnight House]].
* TheNewRussia: a chapter in Silent Man. Wells despises it so much that, if the choices are between nightclubs of Moscow or piss-poor mountains of Afghanistan, he'll return to Afghanistan.
* NiceJobBreakingItHero: by killing government-affiliated mercenaries in Russia, Wells makes it impossible for the CIA to [[spoiler: investigate the attack on him and Exley.]]
* NoodleIncident: In-universe. Just exactly what happened in the Midnight House?
* NotSoDifferent: Francesca screams this to Wells as they are fighting. But Wells knows better.
--> '''Francesca''': You think you're any different than me, John? That what you think?
--> ''Yeah, somewhere on the way, you stopped caring who you killed.''
* LawyerFriendlyCameo: Averted in the Secret Soldier. Abdullah, the king of Saudi Arabia, appears as himself and serves as a major character.
* ObstructiveBureaucrat: Fred Whitby in Midnight House.
* OnlySaneMan: Shafer.
* OsamaBinLaden: Wells met him. Twice. The only CIA agent ever does so.
* PlatonicLifePartners: Exley and Shafer. Though at Midnight House, Wells suspects something deeper. Shafer privately confirms it in Shadow Patrol.
* PluckyComicRelief: Shafer.
* PowerTrio:
** TheHero: Wells
** TheLancer, TheFunnyGuy: Shafer
** TheChick: Exley
** The Smart Guy: Shafer and Exley alternate.
* RealityEnsues: Subtly, about Wells and Exley's relationship. In the Faithful Spy, their attachment resembles Romeo and Juliet's, and in the end they do get together. But in subsequent books, now that they move in and live together, they have to deal with each other's strength and weakness.
* ReplacementLoveInterest: Anne, [[spoiler: after Exley leaves Wells at the end of Silent Man]].
* RoaringRampageofRevenge:
** Wells, when [[spoiler: Kowalski tries to assassinate him and his girlfriend]] in Silent Man.
** [[spoiler: Steve Callar]] in Midnight House.
* RomanceEnsues: Wells and Exley at their DC trip in Faithful Spy.
* SaidBookism: Averted with a vengeance. Berenson's such a good author that his dialogue speaks all it needs to speak.
* SaudiArabia: the setting of Secret Soldier.
* ScrewTheRulesImDoingWhatsRight:
** Li wants to save China by ignoring all sensible diplomacy with the United States.
** Wells goes to Moscow to hunt those behind the attempt on him and Exley. He is convinced that Kremlin won't surrender them and CIA won't pursue further. [[spoiler: He fails.]]
* ShellShockedVeteran: Poor Wells.
* ShownTheirWork
* SpannerInTheWorks:
** [[spoiler: Cao]] in Ghost War.
** [[spoiler: Bashir]] in Silent Man. [[spoiler: But he failed]].
** [[spoiler: Mohammed Fariz]] in the Midnight House.
* StartOfDarkness: [[spoiler: Lautner's wife and brother were]] killed by Al Qaeda triple agent. CIA, specially Duto, refused to own that up. That prompts [[spoiler: Lautner]] into his FaceHeelTurn.
* StateSec: Chinese MSS in Ghost War, Egyptian mukhabarat and Pakistani ISI in Midnight House, Saudi muk in Secret Soldier.
* SequelHook
** In Silent Man, Wells makes a coin flip: heads, he kills Kowalski; tails, he sees Evan. [[spoiler: Subverted. The Midnight House reveals he ends up backpacking to Asia.]]
** In Midnight House, Duto tells Wells that Wells will eventually be back for the CIA. [[spoiler: Wells doesn't.]]
** In Secret Soldier, Wells feels that his beef with Saeed isn't over.
** In Shadow Patrol, Amadullah still has anti-aircraft missiles. And one day he will use them.
* TheStoic: Wells.
* SupportingProtagonist: ''The Silent Man'' is overloaded with these. You have Grigory, a scientist who helps with the warhead theft; Bashir, an doctor who transforms the warhead into a working nuclear bomb; Kowalski, an arms dealer who tries to stop his feud with Wells by selling out a jihadi involved on the warhead theft; and Wells, who would never have heard of the nuclear plot if Kowalski hadn't tried to assassinate him and his girlfriend. The real protagonist of the book? It's Sayyid Nasiji, the VillainProtagonist.
* TortureAlwaysWorks: Deconstructed heavily in Midnight House. It works, but at what cost?
* TortureCellar: the eponymous Midnight House.
* UltimateJobSecurity: Zig-zagged. After the Faithful Spy, Duto rewards Wells and Exley and Shafer his CIA director-level credentials, but puts them outside official chain-of-command of Langley. This means that our trio have blank check on whatever work they do, but one mistake and they are fired.
* UpToEleven: Berenson is as nice to Wells as Creator/JossWhedon to Buffy. Just how much mental torture Wells has to pass through? Being infected by the plague? Tortured by Chinese prison guards? [[spoiler: Left by his fiance?]] [[spoiler: Played by his boss?]] Shooting an incapacitated enemy in the back? [[spoiler: Having to kill fellow Americans?]]
* VillainProtagonist: Sayyid Nasiji in ''The Silent Man''. The whole novel revolves around his plot to nuke America. [[spoiler: Of course, he fails.]]
* [[AntagonistTitle Villain Title]]: The Shadow Patrol. It refers to a sniper duet that goes rogue in Afghanistan, Wells' ultimate enemy in the eponymous book.
* WarOnTerror
* WellIntentionedExtremist: Li wants to purge corrupt ministers in Chinese leadership so Chinese nation can achieve greater prosperity. Only one problem: [[spoiler: he does so by pushing China to war with America]]
* WhatExactlyIsHisJob: In a pleasant twist, Wells asks this to himself. After the Faithful Spy, there isn't much he could do in CIA. Sure, he saves America once every year so far, but he doesn't have a daily job.
* WhatTheHellHero: Wells gets so many in Silent Man. From Rosette, Shafer, Duto, Kowalski, and Exley.
* WorldHalfFull: Wells has issues with his faith, relationship, and politics. And yet he still trusts that what he's doing is right.
