The Gray Man (novel)

The novel opens with a man covered in blood exfiltrating a successful assassination of the brother of the president of an African country. His name is Courtland Gentry, referred to as Court. He is the Gray Man, an internationally renowned former CIA assassin known for taking on morally good kill missions. During his exfiltration, he observes a US Army Chinook helicopter trailing smoke and crashing from a missile strike. Though he knows he needs to ignore the crash and continue on his own mission to get out of danger, he finds himself torn because he is an American patriot and can't leave the possible survivors to the fate of torture and public execution by Al Qaeda.

At the crash site, most of the few survivors are cut down and their bodies desecrated by the crowd that forms around them, including newly arrived Al Qaeda operatives who shot down the helicopter. All of a sudden, the perpetrators start to be cut down by accurate and deadly sniper fire. Court Gentry has thrown his extraction plans to the wind and is exacting swift justice via a Barrett .50 caliber rifle from a distance. He knows he is putting himself in harm's way but continues to expend his ammunition. After the firing stops, the survivors of the sniper attack find the last two current survivors of the helicopter crash and load them up to transport them to a secure place for execution. On their way, this convoy encounters a checkpoint that they observe is lackadaisically manned by a skeleton crew of local jihadists. However, the Gray Man has killed the guards and swiftly eliminates the insurgents and drives the surviving US servicemen away. Court gets the lone surviving marine close to a FOB and leaves.

The Gray Man's handler, Sir Donald Fitzroy, runs an international assassination and support network for his assets. He is visited at his office by a lawyer from an international corporation called LaurentGroup, Lloyd. Lloyd previously worked for the CIA in an administrative role and apparently knew the Gray Man. Lloyd outlines that he knows Fitzroy is The Gray Man's handler and explains that he will pay Fitzroy to facilitate the termination of the Gray Man. This is because LaurentGroup has invested billions of dollars into oil infrastructure with the current president of an African nation who will be leaving office soon. Since the President's brother was assassinated by The Gray Man, the president is threatening to terminate the deal with Laurent unless they facilitate the murder and literal delivery of The Gray Man's head to him.

Fitzroy refuses Lloyd's offer, but Lloyd has Fitzroy's son's family picked up and held as hostage unless Fitzroy complies. Reluctantly, Fitzroy orders the secondary extraction team he sent to get The Gray Man out of Iraq to kill him. Aboard the transportation extraction aircraft, Court Gentry realizes the mercenaries transporting him speaking under their masked faces but not on the radio channel they all were previously on. He warns them not to do what they are thinking about but quickly springs into action as a gunfight breaks out in the cargo hold while the plane is in the air. Court kills 4 of the 5 other men in the cargo hold and escapes with his life, though he has been shot in the leg. One of the men he killed had been blown out of the plane wearing a parachute and Court survives by skydiving out and grabbing a hold of the body tightly as the parachute auto deploys at the minimum safe deploy distance. He contacts Fitzroy plainly asking what the heck just happened, but Fitzroy manages to convince the Gray Man that he had nothing to do with it and the men acted rogue.

Lloyd realizes he needs additional support and calls in Henrik Riegel, the head of the action arm of LaurentGroup who an expert at hunting and experienced dealing with internal and external threats to LaurentGroup via violence. Lloyd and Riegel set up a contest by contracting assassination teams from intelligence agencies all over the world from dictatorships with the lure of a $20 million prize on the head of the Gray Man. Laurent employs hundreds of "pavement artists," people who scour pretty much any area looking for a person to provide intel to kill teams. The pavement artists get lucky and locate Court at a hostel and the first arriving kill squad gets vectored to him. Court is an early riser and encounters the team at a coffee shop while on his way out of the area. He lures them into a subway and kills them swiftly, though he admits he himself got lucky that he encountered them in the way he did. Court contacts Fitzroy again asking what is going on and Fitzroy says that the Nigerians are after him and have contracted these kill teams. Fitzroy lies and says the Nigerians are the ones who have his family hostage and that they are being held in Normandy. Court had a short stint as a bodyguard for Fitzroy's niece and feels a close connection to her. Because of this Fitzroy, Lloyd, and Riegel know that he will come to rescue the family. Court buys the story and does not realize that Fitzroy is actively working against him.

Gentry has been on the run from the CIA for the last five years after he was targeted by his own team and killed them all in self-defense. He does not know why he was targeted but killed his attackers and escaped the US and has been a contract assassin for the past five years. His reputation proceeds him as he has pulled off kills that both seemed impossible of some of the worst actors in the world, perpetrators of genocide, mafia bosses, etc. Multiple times people ask him if he pulled off the Kiev operation, though there is doubt as the feat was so incredible it seemed impossible one man could do it.

Knowing he needs to get documents forged so he can enter the European Union, Court goes to Hungary where he plans to obtain a forged passport from a man named Laszlo Szabo. He had encountered Szabo years earlier while working with a CIA kill team called the Goon Squad of which he was the point man. The Goon Squad was targeting a terrorist that was using Szabo for forged documents, killed the terrorist, and in the process Szabo's leg was seriously injured. Court doesn't think Szabo will recognize him as he was wearing a mask during the raid. Szabo is naturally suspicious but grants Court entry and has him change his appearance. As Szabo is taking Court's picture for the passport however, he triggers a trap door that traps The Gray Man in a cistern-like well with bulletproof glass at the top. Szabo reveals that in the years following Court's escape from the US, the CIA had revealed to Szabo that Court was responsible for his injuries as the CIA thought Court might attempt to use his services and to incentivize Szabo to contact them when it happens. Szabo is a snake and attempts to ransom Court both through Fitzroy and by contacting the CIA directly, not realizing the CIA is just going to send a kill team and kill everyone there. By contacting Fitzroy however, he unwittingly has one of the kill squads vectored to his location as well.

The CIA kill team shows up and forces Szabo to show them where Gentry is being held. Having just checked on him previously and throughout the last couple of hours while he was arranging everything, Szabo assures the kill team that The Gray Man is trapped. However, Court has been planning his escape by removing the bullet powder from his ammunition and creating a bomb that will blow through the glass at the top and using a makeshift saw out of his necklace to cut a pipe to fill the cistern with liquid. As the CIA kill team leader looks down, he asks Szabo what is going on, why did you drown the Gray Man, and all of a sudden, the top blows off and Gentry shoots out with a ton of water. Simultaneously, one of the Laurent kill squads arrives and a huge firefight breaks out. Szabo is the first one to die as Court makes his escape quickly. The Laurent kill team is wiped out by the CIA kill squad, though we don't know how many CIA guys died.

Lloyd and Riegel learn their team has failed and pressure Fitzroy for information on The Gray Man's next location. Fitzroy tells them of a cache in the Swiss mountains that only three people ever knew about, Court, Fitzroy, and a dead man. If they fail to kill him at this location, Court will know that Fitzroy cannot be trusted.

The Gray Man hitchhikes and arrives at the cache in the Swiss mountains which is a small cabin and a small, detached shed containing a ton of gear. At this point, he is exhausted and still wounded from his leg gunshot on the cargo airplane. He arrives early in the morning, eats some rations, makes some hasty defensive preparations, and promptly falls asleep at 4:45am. At 5am, a LaurentGroup kill squad made up of Libyan assassins arrives. They surround the cabin and lob in a grenade to the propped open front door. They are surprised when the grenade sails back out immediately. Before falling asleep Court had rolled a steel door mantrap in front of the entrance which deflected the grenade back out. The explosion injures one of the Libyans and wakes up Court who kicks two bags of gear into the small cellar and takes cover. The Libyans quickly recover and toss in a huge satchel charge which blows a big hole in the front of the house. They quickly realize The Gray Man is in the cellar and start to breach. However, the door of the shed blows open and surprises the Libyan stationed at the back of the cabin as Court flies out on a snowmobile. There was a tunnel from the cellar to the backyard shed that he went through, though he had leave most of the gear except a sawn-off shotgun and some other small things. Court realizes the direction he has driven out of the shed has no escape as he is at the top of a cliff and realizes he is trapped. He rigs the snowmobile to go back down the hill as a distraction and jumps off the cliff sliding down and losing the rest of his gear and re aggravating his gunshot wound and adding a ton of other bruises and scrapes to his body. He slips away and realizes Fitzroy has betrayed him.

He calls Fitzroy and ends up speaking to Lloyd, who is surprised that The Gray Man doesn't remember him. Court says that he won't come for Fitzroy's family now because he knows it's a trap and because he was betrayed. Lloyd tells Court that he also took the classified identities of all the US spy assets and will reveal them to the world unless Court comes to the chateau in Normandy where the Fitzroy's are being held and the hunt for him is being run out of. Lloyd knows that Court's patriotism and sense of moral good won't allow this to happen. Reluctantly Court hangs up and resolves to conduct this in extremis rescue mission.

Court has stolen a bike near the Swiss village which he rode to a train station and bought a ticket. He falls asleep on the train but unknowingly one of the pavement artists saw him and tracked him on the train. The Swiss cops however are on the lookout for suspects from the cabin shootout and interrogate Court on the train because he fits the description of someone leaving the scene. Court had a gun on him that he stashed in the side of the train seat but because of his lack of identification and the arrival of police reinforcements, 8 total, he winds up getting searched and his empty ankle holster and subsequent hidden gun getting discovered. Court Gentry wouldn't kill police officers anyway but with so many there he could not even try to take them down with non-lethal force before he would have been shot down. He allows himself to be taken into custody and is handcuffed to a bench at the next train station.

Another kill team has been vectored to the location and Court tries to warn the cops about the two suspicious parked vans. One of the senior officers walks up to one of the vans and is immediately killed and 8 assassins armed with MP5s start shooting it out with the few cops who are armed only with handguns. As the police numbers dwindle and one of the police officers is shot right next to Court, he manages to take the handcuff key off the police officer and use the cop's pistol to shoot the two closest assassins in the face. Court grabs some cover and thinks about just leaving the remaining police but decided to go back and help them. Fortunately, police reinforcements arrive and pin down the rest of the assassins, so Court is able to make his escape.

Court arrives in Brussels where he infiltrates the home of his trainer for the special CIA program that he was shaped in, a man named Maurice. Maurice is now older and was drummed out of the CIA for supposedly embezzling funds. Though the training almost killed him, the two men are happy to see each other and share a few beers. Maurice's house is being watched by pavement artists but neither man thinks they have been compromised. Maurice has been following the news reports of shootouts getting closer and wondered when Court was going to show up. Court explains the situation and Maurice agrees to provide him with a clean car and gear to facilitate the hostage rescue and prevention of the CIA info being released. As Court is about to leave, both men realized the pavement artists aren't there anymore and a kill squad must be en route. Maurice tells Court how to get away and promises to buy him time. Maurice had revealed to be suffering from both liver and lung disease and only has a few months to live. Just then a South African kill team from Laurent busts in and finds Maurice sitting alone in his kitchen. They rough him up a little bit and hear a report that Court has been spotted outside. They shoot Maurice with a shotgun but the blast ends up killing the whole kill team because Maurice had started a gas leak in his kitchen and the explosion levels his house.

Court makes his way to the car Maurice gave him which is a late model Mercedes S series filled with a modern M4, Mp5, pistols, and other gear. Court realizes that Maurice did embezzle the money and that he gave him this stuff knowing that Court would know that. He is angered by the loss of one of his last and only close people.

As time goes on, the LaurentGroup team starts pulling all the kill teams in closer to their location in Normandy with a focus on Paris as Court must come through there to get to his objective. Court does go to Paris in the hopes of recruiting a former helicopter pilot associate to help him infiltrate the chateau but realizes there is so much surveillance and so many kill teams that he is in danger and wouldn't be able to secure the man's help anyway. As he is trying to exfiltrate the area, he is spotted after avoiding most of the pavement artists and is ambushed by the lone assassin sent by South Korea. This man is an accomplished singleton operator much like Court and positioned himself in a spot where he figured The Gray Man would go based on all of the other coverage. The South Korean manages to stab The Gray Man as he ambushes him, though Court was able to prevent the knife from completely gutting his stomach by catching some of the blow with his umbrella hook. In an intense hand to hand fight, the Gray Man manages to kill the South Korean but the noise of their battle alerts the other close kill teams and The Gray Man is very close to being caught. Grievously injured, the Gray Man jumps into the English Channel and grabs onto a passing barge which drags him downstream.

Court is basically dead, however he gets a call from Fitzroy's niece who managed to steal a phone under the direction of Fitzroy. While all of this has been going on, Fitzroy's son was killed while trying to prevent one of his daughters from accidentally escaping. Fitzroy himself was tortured and had a few fingers cut off. Fitzroy knows that Court needs the extra incentive and pretends to be complacent from all that he's had to endure, but secretly has his niece steal the phone from one of the henchmen in the house and has her call Court because he knows it's the extra motivation the Gray Man needs.

Court uses his last strength to go to a doctor in Fitzroy's network who turns out just to be a veterinarian assistant. They drive to the clinic where Court has her get material to give him stiches and a few drugs. While he drives, he has the assistant give him stiches to his knife wound and he passes out from shock. They crash but it's minor and they are close to the Chateau. Court has her inject him with an adrenaline type drug which will allow him to have the energy to make a last ditch assault on the chateau. He is able to get close by having the assistant drive some crappy car close to the chateau while he hids in the trunk. They arrive and he prepares to go inside, but one of the kill teams shows up. The assistant thinks Court has abandoned her but he suddenly and silently kills the 4 man team.

There had been a time crunch by LaurentGroup because the president of Nigeria was about to leave office on this last day the threat he was going to pull their oil contract if The Gray Man was not killed before the deadline. The deadline passes and the President's assistant informs Laurentgroup that they have failed and the contract will be pulled. Court calls Lloyd and threatens him by saying he is at the chateau. The President's assistant contacts the remaining kill teams directly and tells them all to come to the chateau and the first team to kill the Gray Man will still get the bounty. This kicks off a huge gunbattle between all of the kill teams and the LaurentGroup core security team. As this is happening Lloyd turns on Riegel in order to control the narrative and not face any of the fallout of the failed operation. Lloyd shoots Riegel in the chest but is shot himself as the Gray Man assaults the main control room. Gentry has used this opportunity to assault the property himself, eventually securing and destroying the CIA data and getting the Fitzroy family out safely.

The teams all kill each other and Gentry kills the remaining ones and the President's assistant. As he is exfiltrating the chateau with the Fitzroy family, he is shot in the back by Lloyd. Lloyd is about to finish him off when he is shot by Riegel who has stayed alive long enough to exact his revenge on Lloyd. Riegel then dies himself.

Court is wounded and lying in the courtyard of the chateau as a LaurentGroup helicopter arrives. The CEO of LaurentGroup, Marc Laurent himself, is there and offers Court a contract to kill the now former President of Nigera for his betrayal. Court quips that he would accept but he is so injured that he can't. Laurent gets Court medical treatment. There is a flashforward of time where a healed Court visits Fitzroy's niece and says that everything is going to be OK, before he gets into a car with the new head of LaurenGroup's assassination arm to facilitate the assassination of the President of Nigeria.

There have been several attempts to turn the novel into a film, initially with Christopher McQuarrie attached to direct in 2016.^[1] After that version fell through, the project lay dormant until July 2020, when Netflix announced their plans to adapt it. Eventually it was directed by Joe and Anthony Russo, with Joe Russo also writing the screenplay, and Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely performing a re-write. Starring Ryan Gosling, Chris Evans, Ana de Armas, Dhanush, Wagner Moura, Julia Butters, and Jessica Henwick, filming commenced in 2021 on a $200 million budget.^[2][3][4] It was released on July 22, 2022.

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