I was watching my four-year-old son in a playground in Jerusalem a few years back. He was having fun with an American boy his own age. I asked his little friend's mother what she was doing in Jerusalem. "My husband is an ICE agent," she said. Immediately I knew I had to write thrillers about an organization with "ICE" for its name.THE DAMASCUS THREAT takes place in Syria and New York against the backdrop of a chemical weapons plot. The hero is ICE Agent Dominic Verrazzano. I'm following that with CHINA STRIKE, in which Verrazzano tracks the conspiracy further. He also confronts his old commander from his days in Special Ops.My previous novels grew out of my career as a foreign correspondent--four of them are crime novels about a Palestinian detective--and my fascination with history. For my Mozart novel, I learned to play the piano. For my Caravaggio novel, I learned to paint and fence with a rapier. Along the way I picked up some major awards and some nice compliments: major authors have compared my writing with the work of Graham Greene, John Le Carre, Georges Simenon and Henning Mankell. Read more about my books, hear my podcasts and see extra features at mattrees.net.