Discover Well-Read Black Girl Books and the projects reshaping publishing →

Book Summary and Reviews of Supernotes by Agent Kasper

Supernotes by Agent Kasper

Supernotes

A Thriller

by Agent Kasper

  • Critics' Consensus (2):
  • Published:
  • Jan 2016, 272 pages
  • Rate this book

About this book

Book Summary

Already a bestseller in Italy and optioned for film, Supernotes is a novel based on the true story of Agent Kasper, one of the many aliases of a top-level undercover spy who worked for both the American CIA and the Italian intelligence services.

Agent Kasper is a man with a staggering résumé: a former police officer, a former airline pilot, a firearms expert, a highly accomplished practitioner of several of the martial arts, and a secret agent par excellence. In the end, his competence is his undoing.

While in Phnom Penh, Kasper is approached by the CIA to track down the source of the so-called "supernotes" that are flooding Southeast Asia, illegal U.S. banknotes counterfeited so perfectly as to be undetectable, even by sophisticated machines. With patience, skill, and courage, Kasper discovers the explosive secret: a money-printing operation in North Korea. Kasper tells his handlers what he's discovered, and a few days later a Cambodian associate calls him with a single, urgent message: "Leave town now!" But before he can cross the Thai border, Kasper is arrested, apparently on CIA orders. As Kasper suffers through a brutal incarceration, he tries to figure out why the two governments he so heroically served chose to abandon him.

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Reviews

Media Reviews

"The main appeal here is the tantalizing premise, also explored in Roger Hobbs' recent Vanishing Games (2015)." - Booklist

"This translation from Italian is a fast, exciting read inspired by a real agent who risked his life combatting the problem of counterfeiting on an international scale." - Kirkus

"The book provides a fascinating peek behind the curtain of today's global intelligence community, but the back-and-forth narrative essentially destroys the story's momentum." - Publishers Weekly

This information about Supernotes was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.

Reader Reviews

Click here and be the first to review this book!

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Author Information

Agent Kasper

Agent Kasper is a former operative for both the Italian intelligence services and the American CIA. Translated by John Cullen.

More Author Information

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Read-Alikes

Read-Alikes Full readalike results are for members only

If you liked Supernotes, try these:

  • Ilium jacket

    Ilium

    by Lea Carpenter

    Published 2025

    About this book

    Set in the dark world of international espionage, from London to Mallorca, Croatia, Paris, and Cap Ferret: the gripping and suspenseful story of a young woman who unwittingly becomes a perfect asset in the long overdue finale of a covert special op

  • Dr. No jacket

    Dr. No

    by Percival Everett

    Published 2022

    About this book

    A sly, madcap novel about supervillains and nothing, really, from an American novelist whose star keeps rising.

  • The Convert's Song jacket

    The Convert's Song

    by Sebastian Rotella

    Published 2014

    About this book

    A global manhunt sweeps up a former federal agent when his childhood friend becomes the chief suspect in a terrorist rampage.

We have 10 read-alikes for Supernotes, but non-members are limited to three results. Join free to see the complete list of recommendations.
Search read-alikes
How we choose read-alikes
Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

BookBrowse Book Club

Book Jacket
When No One Else Will
by Amanda Skenandore
1940s Chicago nurse risks everything at an illegal women’s clinic during a high-profile trial of courage and sisterhood.

Members Recommend

  • Book Jacket
    Look What You Made Me Do
    by John Lanchester
    A propulsive tale of intergenerational tension and revenge from the Booker Prize nominee.
  • Book Jacket
    The Jellyfish Problem
    by Tessa Yang
    A marine biologist rescues a Maine island menaced by a giant glowing jellyfish in this inventive debut.
  • Book Jacket
    Dangerous, Dirty, Violent, and Young
    by Zayd Ayers Dohrn
    Son of Weather Underground radicals recounts life on the run and decades of revolutionary struggle.
Who Said...

There are two kinds of people in the world: those who divide the world into two kinds of people, and those who don'...

Click Here to find out who said this, as well as discovering other famous literary quotes!

Book
Trivia
  • Book Trivia

    Can you name the title?

    Test your book knowledge with our daily trivia challenge!

Wordplay

Solve this clue:

Q S, S

and be entered to win..

Your guide toexceptional          books

BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.