A Reading Update and the Spy / Thriller Novel Continued

Bonnie says enjoy your upcoming weekend and read a good book

After yesterdays rain, today it's sunny, bright and warm. Doors and windows wide open to let the breeze through. I finished off a book this morning, hoping to maybe finish at least one more before end June. I'll update that and also provide the synopsis for the next one in line. I'll also continue with my ongoing look at the Spy / Thriller genre, a classic author of the genre today.

Just Finished

1. Stardust by Joseph Kanon (2009). This is the second book I've enjoyed by Kanon.

"Stardust is the second book by author Joseph Kanon that I've read. The book is set just after the 2nd World War. Ben Collier has returned from a tour of duty in Germany, traveling by train from New York to California. In California he will work with Continental Studios to put a documentary on German concentration camps. On the train he meets the CEO of the studio Sol Lasner and help him when he has a heart attack. Another reason for Ben's trip to California is that Ben's brother Daniel is in the hospital on death's bed after 'falling' from a balcony.

Now this isn't a simple story. While in California, Ben will develop feelings for Daniel's wife, Liesl. (After Daniel's death in hospital that is). The main part of the story is Ben trying to find out if Daniel was murdered and if so, who did it. He is in California during the beginning's of the Communist witch hunts. Was Daniel involved? Was he one who provided names to the politicians, specifically California Congressman Minot? What about the circle of German ex-pats who reside in California, including Liesl, her family and the others?

Throw in the friction at the studios, including labor problems and also Ben's dealings with and ex-FBI agent working with Minot, Polly the gossip reporter who might also be doing so... er... and so many other things. It can be a confusing story, peopled with so many characters and so many ongoing stories but it's well-written and there are sympathetic characters. Kanon can spin an interesting story and it's well worth making the effort to get into it. Lots of tension, some romancing and even action sequences. Kanon is worth trying. (4 stars)"

Currently Reading

1. Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys (19 ). I've read a couple of Rhys's other books. She's not my favorite but still worth reading.

"Antoinette Cosway is a Creole heiress - product of an inbred, decadent, expatriate community - a sensitive girl at once beguiled and repelled by the lush Jamaican landscape. Soon after her marriage to Rochester rumours of madness in the Cosway family poison Rochester's mind against her."

The Spy / Thriller Novel - John le Carré

John le Carré

David John Moore Cornwell, aka John le Carré, was born in Dorset, England in 1931. Over his long life he's written 25 novels in the spy genre. During his life he also worked for the British MI5 and MI6. I started off many, many years ago reading his classic trilogy, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, The Honourable Schoolboy and Smiley's People. I also read, didn't necessarily enjoy, The Little Drummer Girl. After that last book, it took me awhile to get back into le Carré's writing but in the past few years, I've begun to enjoy his work again. I'll take a look at a few of those books and also some I've got on my bookshelf awaiting my attention.

1. Call for the Dead (1961 / George Smiley #1).

"George Smiley had liked the man and now the man was dead. Suicide. But why? An anonymous letter had alleged that Foreign Office man Samuel Fennan had been a member of the Communist Party as a student before the war. Nothing very unusual for his generation.

Smiley had made it clear that the investigation, little more than a routine security check, was over and that the file on Fennan could be closed. Next day, Fennan was dead with a note by his body saying his career was finished and he couldn’t go on." (5 stars)

2. The Constant Gardener (2001).

"Tessa Quayle--young, beautiful, and dearly beloved to husband Justin--is gruesomely murdered in northern Kenya. When Justin sets out on a personal odyssey to uncover the mystery of her death, what he finds could make him not only a suspect, but also a target for Tessa's killers.

A master chronicler of the betrayals of ordinary people caught in political conflict, John le Carré portrays the dark side of unbridled capitalism as only he can. In The Constant Gardener he tells a compelling, complex story of a man elevated through tragedy, as Justin Quayle--amateur gardener, aging widower, and ineffectual bureaucrat--discovers his own natural resources and the extraordinary courage of the woman he barely had time to love." (4 stars)

3. A Delicate Truth (2013).

"A counterterrorist operation, code-named Wildlife, is being mounted on the British crown colony of Gibraltar. Its purpose: to capture and abduct a high-value jihadist arms buyer. Its authors: an ambitious Foreign Office minister, a private defence contractor who is also his bosom friend, and a shady American CIA operative of the evangelical far right. So delicate is the operation that even the minister’s private secretary, Toby Bell, is not cleared for it. 

Three years later, a disgraced special forces soldier delivers a message from the dead. Was Operation Wildlife the success it was cracked up to be—or a human tragedy that was ruthlessly covered up? Summoned by Sir Christopher “Kit” Probyn, retired British diplomat, to his decaying Cornish manor house and closely observed by Kit’s daughter, Emily, Toby must choose between his conscience and duty to his service. If the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing, how can he keep silent?"

4. A Murder of Quality (1962 / George Smiley #2).

"George Smiley was simply doing a favor for Miss Ailsa Brimley, and old friend and editor of a small newspaper. Miss Brimley had received a letter from a worried reader: "I'm not mad. And I know my husband is trying to kill me." But the letter had arrived too late: its scribe, the wife of an assistant master at the distinguished Carne School, was already dead.

So George Smiley went to Carne to listen, ask questions, and think. And to uncover, layer by layer, the complex network of skeletons and hatreds that comprised that little English institution."

5. A Small Town in Germany (1968)

"This was John le Carre's 5th novel and one that did not feature his most famous spy master, George Smiley. The main character is Alan Turner, a Foreign Office employee who has been sent to the British embassy in Bonn to find out what has happened to an embassy employee, Leo Harting, a German national who seems to have disappeared with a number of secret files. 

This is a tense period in European history, set after WWII, when the Russians are heating up things, Germany seems to be in turmoil, looking at entering NATO, the European Common market, while students are rioting. Not the time for the British to be worried about whether one of the employees has defected to Russia with important documents. Turner, an abrasive individual, is the man to try to find out what happened. 

I enjoyed the pace of this story, as Turner interrogates and searches for clues in an embassy that seems to want to bury the situation. What was Leo Harting up to? Was he a mole for the Russians? Did he have other motives for the research he was conducting? It was all very interesting, except, for me, the ending, which was without any satisfying resolution. At least to me, anyway. But still an excellent example of le Carre's story telling and his knowledge of political intrigue. A solid 3.5 stars."

6. The Spy Who Came in from the Cold (1963 / George Smiley #3).

"Fantastic story. A classic spy novel, classic Le Carré story. His third novel, after  Call For The Dead and a A Murder of Quality. It features tired spy, Alec Leamas, the British Secret Services Berlin organizer, who is called home for a special mission. I won't get into too many details as there are so many interesting surprises throughout the story, that I wouldn't want to ruin it. There is a brief role for le Carré's most famous spy, George Smiley, but the story revolves mostly around Leamas. The spy craft is interesting, the plot twisting, the story fascinating and one you will have difficulty putting down. An excellent story for those who enjoy spy dramas and also a nicely historical feel for the cold war between the West and East.. Great stuff.. (5 stars)"

7. The Looking Glass War (1965 / Smiley #4).

"When the Department - faded since the war and busy only with bureaucratic battles - hears rumour of a missile base near the West German border, it seems like the perfect opportunity to regain some political standing in the Intelligence market place. The Cold War is at its height and the Department is dying for a piece of the action.

Swiftly becoming carried away by fear and pride, the Department and her officers send deactivated agent Fred Leiser back into East Germany, armed only with some schoolboy training and his memories of the war.

In the land of eloquent silence that is Communist East Germany, Leiser's fate becomes inseparable from the Department's."

8. Our Kind of Traitor (2010).

"I've read many books by John le Carré. He's one of the great spy masters when it comes to story telling. Our Kind of Traitor: A Novel is one of his more recent stories, published originally in 2010. I enjoyed the story but I think in many ways it was style over substance.

Perry and Gail a young English couple decide to take a vacation in Antigua. There they meet a group of Russians led by Dima who attaches himself to the couple.

 

It turns out that Dima is a member of a powerful Russian gangster (vory) organization; their money launderer, and he wants to defect, along with his family to England. He indicates he has much to offer the UK in return.

Perry and Gail are interrogated by Luke, Yvonne, Ollie and their boss Hector back in London. Hector comes up with a plan to help Dima and his family defect. Dima is attending meetings in Paris and Bern to authorize fund transfer within the organization and feels he will be killed afterwards.

The rest of the story is the attempt by this group to help the family get back to England. le Carré has a unique story telling style. The first half of the story is basically told via the interrogation of Perry and Gail, but in the second half there is much more action as we travel to Paris and then onwards to Switzerland. All in all it's a well told story, with interesting characters. The ending was somewhat disappointing but different. It was nice to try a le Carré story again. (4 stars)"

So there you go, a few ideas for you. The complete list of le Carré's works can be found at this link.