The Summer Guests

I was so enthralled by The Spy Coast that I immediately checked out the 2nd book in the "Martini Club" series by Tess Gerritsen. It was equally engrossing--Publishers Weekly calls it a "lively sequel"-- to the point that I stayed up late to finish it. This is a story about a missing teenager, a body found in the bottom of the local lake, and a decades-old massacre that has scapegoated one of the resident families in Purity, Maine. As in the previous book, Maggie and her jolly band of ex-CIA spies are on the case and usually several steps ahead of the local police...but then they do have some special skills and special resources that even police chief Jo Thibodeau doesn't have. This story is absolutely loaded with red herrings and chapters told from various characters' points of view. None of this lessens the driving plot line, however. 

Following a brief prologue, we jump to present day when "the Conovers, a family of longtime summer residents, are arriving back in town. Fifteen-year-old Zoe goes swimming in Maiden Pond with a newfound friend and mysteriously disappears later that day. She is an excellent swimmer and diver, so drowning seems unlikely. Perhaps she has been abducted, perhaps worse. She is not 'the sort of girl you’d think would get into trouble'" (Kirkus). Kirkus goes on to describe Maggie and friends as "a delightful group of five retired government spooks who just love a good puzzle to keep their aging brains in shape. They are merry meddlers who keep trying to help Thibodeau..." and concludes their review with "A complex mix of fright and fun."

Publishers Weekly concludes their favorable review by saying, "As in the first book, Gerritsen paints Maggie and her crew with a fine brush, and strikes a satisfying tone...These sexagenarian spies are hitting their stride."  

The Spy Coast

This thriller from Tess Gerritsen kept me engaged the entire time. There is a small community of ex-CIA spies living in the small town of Purity on the coast of Maine. They wanted the quiet life in their retirement or at least they thought they did. But when a stranger accosts ex-spy Maggie Bird at her chicken farm, it appears that her past has finally caught up with her. The body of that same woman is dumped in Maggie's driveway the following day after having clearly being tortured. Maggie's friends, Declan and Ben are determined to hep Maggie figure out who is after her even though she would prefer they stay safely away from her search. Alternating chapters reveal the back story about why someone might be hunting her down. The ending is a surprise.

Publishers Weekly concludes their positive review by saying "The plot bustles along nicely, careening from Thailand to Italy and many points in between, but the real surprise is the richness of Gerritsen's supporting cast, a cantankerous bunch whose love for one another runs deep. Some details toward the end hint that a sequel may be in the works, and it'd be more than welcome. Maggie and her gray-haired tribe are more than capable of helming a long-running series." Similarly, Booklist recommends the book as "Compelling reading throughout, with astute characterizations, a fast-moving but understandable spy plot, and lashings of dark humor. Gerritsen fans and readers of Richard Osman's Thursday Murder Club mysteries will love this."

The Winter Sea

When I first saw the length of this book, I was a bit daunted, but once I started, I could hardly put it down. Author Susanna Kearsley tells a story within a story, Her protagonist, Carrie McClelland, is a successful writer of historical novels and has come to the northwest coast of Scotland, both to visit her agent, Jane, who has a new baby, and also to pursue her research on a book she wants to write about the Jacobite effort in the spring of 1708 to bring the younger James back from exile in France to take his rightful place as their king. Carrie decides on Jane's advice to tell the story from a woman's viewpoint and so Carrie creates Sophia, an orphan who has been taken in by a distant relative, the Countess of Slains Castle, which Carrie has chosen for the setting of her novel. In fact, Carrie has rented a cottage in the town closest to the ruins of that castle to inspire her writing. "The chapters are intermingled throughout the book with numerical designations such as chapter 1, 2, 3, etc. for the present and Roman numerals for the historical segments such as I, II, III, etc." (NY Journal of Books).

I love the way that the New York Review of Books opens their summary and review. "The Winter Sea ... is a creative tour de force. Sometimes an author catches lightning in a bottle, and Susanna Kearsley has done just that." They go on to conclude, "The title—The Winter Sea—is also quite moving. When Sophia is alone and worried that she will never see Moray [her husband] again, his Uncle Graeme reminds her that without the desolation of winter there can be no ever-renewing hope of spring. It is a hard lesson about accepting the bad in order to appreciate the good, but it is a lesson worth learning and relearning throughout life."

Similarly, the Historical Novel Society offers this praise, "Kearsley handles modern Scots dialects adroitly... Overall, skillful writing and research make The Winter Sea more historical novel than romance. Although Cassie’s choices are at times predictable, readers will not be disappointed in Sophia’s enthralling story. Highly recommended."

Our Woman in Moscow

I enjoyed this book by Beatriz Williams more than some others I have read lately.  I like good historical fiction and this book is centered on the period of the Cold War (1952) with some flashbacks to the summer of 1940 in Rome just as war was engulfing Europe and to 1948 in Great Britain. Ruth and Iris Macallister are twin sisters but couldn't be more different. Ruth is confident and brash, Iris is timid and unassuming. They go for an extended stay in Rome, where their brother is working at the American embassy. When a colleague of their brother's, who  also  works at the embassy, starts paying attention to Iris, she is swept off her feet; Ruth disapproves of the relationship. As the war draws closer, Ruth returns to America, but Iris stays behind with her lover, Sasha Digby. Ruth and Iris fall out of touch. Years later, Iris, Sasha and their children disappear from London and the suspicion is that they have defected to Russia. Readers have known all along that Sasha was passing information along to the Communists. After over 12 years of no contact, Ruth receives a postcard from Iris asking Ruth to come to Moscow to support Iris during a difficult pregnancy and, of course, Ruth will still do anything to help her sister. Then Ruth is contacted by an FBI agent, Sumner Fox, who wants to join her --ostensibly as her husband--to try and get the Digbys out of Russia; an agent from the KGB is equally determined to see that doesn't happen. Quite a good thriller and I didn't see the ending coming. Reviews available from Kirkus, Publisher's Weekly, and a lengthier review in The Star Tribune.

A Delicate Truth

John le Carré is nothing if not the master of unease. His characters are always struggling with action vs. no action, morality vs. complacency--and this tale is no exception. So slow starting that I almost did not continue reading, I was eventually gripped by the struggle of career Foreign Office rising star, Toby Bell. His mentor, Giles Oakley, has nurtured and guided him through various postings and Toby has returned the favor by covering up an indiscretion in Berlin. Toby eventually ends up as the private secretary to a junior Cabinet minister who is so secretive that he stays in his locked office during much of the day, refuses to let Toby see his diary or prepare his briefcase for trips. Toby eventually learns that this ambitious and gullible junior minister is being led by the nose by a private information brokering group, so he secretly records a meeting. He finds out that some operation is being planned and will be carried out, but none of the details. Meanwhile, long-serving diplomatic underling Christopher Probyn is pulled into the plot and told that he will be the minister's eyes and ears on an "extraordinary rendition" of a "high value target." That is, he will observe while a terrorist is kidnapped by a combined force of British soldiers operating off the books--at the minister's request--and some mercenaries organized by the aforementioned information brokers.Three years later, through a chance encounter with one of the British soldiers, Kit, now Sir Christopher Probyn, learns that the whole secret operation was botched. There was no high value target and an innocent woman and her young child were shot to death in the process. The whole thing has been covered up. Kit enlists Toby to help him reveal this misdeed, but the information brokering firm will stop at nothing, including murder, to keep this quiet. How much are Kit and Toby willing to risk to see evil revealed and justice done?

The book was a little hard to follow at times. Places are named, but it is not always clear what the timing is until you read a bit further into a chapter. It feels like Le Carré was being just a bit too clever in this one. As always the characters are complex and convincing and the moral struggle is made altogether believable and makes you question what you would do in these people's shoes. Puts me in mind of the really excellent BBC mini-series recently aired, starring Bill Nighy, about an MI5 analyst risking it all to reveal an unholy alliance between the British prime minister and a private corporation building "black sites" for the interrogation of terrorist suspects. The first was called "Page Eight" and you can find them on Netflix or IMDB.

The Information Officer

Ah well, the usual consequence of turning me on to a new author (Mark Mills) and turning me loose in Powell's bookstore has happened. I bought the two books he previously published (prior to Amagansett) and devoured them both. The Information Officer is set in Malta during WWII with the major players being British soldiers/aviators--along with one American "liaison" officer. Having also just bought and read Erik Larson's non-fiction account of Berlin from 1933-37 (In the Garden of Beasts), I was in a  receptive frame of mind for this historically based murder mystery. Mills claims, through his main character  British Army Information Officer Max Chadwick, that more bombs were dropped on Malta in a few months than on all of London in the Blitz. Wikipedia claims (and other sources back this) that "Between 20 March and 28 April 1942, the Germans flew 11,819 sorties against the island and dropped 6,557 tons of bombs (3,150 tons on Valletta)"--Valletta being the main city and main harbor. Mills has done his historical research. Suffice to say that the residents of Malta experienced death and destruction on a daily basis, so it's no wonder that the deaths of a few dance hall girls might go unnoticed amid the carnage, especially as they have been artfully disguised to look like collateral damage from the bombings. That is until the local military doctor/surgeon (Freddie Lambert) brings the latest victim to the attention of Max, along with "evidence" that the murderer is a British submariner. Our protagonist is torn between wanting to keep up morale through his positive spins on information, and bringing the matter to the attention of the authorities. He finally decides to do the latter, but in secret, through local contacts. It is only when his own lover disappears, along with the local detective who had been investigating the deaths, that the case gets really personal for Max. Meanwhile, interspersed throughout the commentary, are excerpts from the killer's journal which range from the original impetus for his first kill to the latter entries where he gloats at getting away with the murders and wanting to up the challenge for himself. We also learn that he is spying and sowing disinformation on behalf of the Germans. The identity of the killer is a surprise, partly due to the fact that few of the characters are fully developed, and I found the novel is more evocative (of time and place and social manners) than satisfying. I would still recommend it, and it spurred me on to read another novel by Mill, The Savage Garden.

Charlie M

Brian Freemantle has written a whole series of books about Charlie Muffin, who really dislikes being called Charles. I'd never heard of them, and can't honestly remember now how I found out about the series, but it sounded like he'd found a winning formula so thought I'd check it out by reading the first one. Set during the Cold War, Charlie is a spy--a leftover from a previous regime that apparently had some embarrassing events which resulted in a new Director and a wholesale housecleaning of the staff. Charlie cultivates a rumpled, even shabby appearance, but is still the most knowledgable agent they have. His ruthlessly ambitious and probably sociopathic new boss, Cuthbertson, sets Charlie up to get captured while crossing from East Berlin. Charlie, ever a  survivor, outwits the treachery, although a man Charlie was trying to help escape to the West gets killed in his place. His new boss also attempts to diminish the importance of Charlie's recent capture of a major Russian spymaster operating in Great Britain, but this backfires, so Cuthbertson is forced to keep Charlie on staff. He does manage to shove Charlie into a former broom closet of an office and is threatening a demotion. Now a major player in the KGB is making noises about defecting, and after Cuthbertson's still wet-behind-the-ears agents get killed or captured, Charlie is brought in to save the play. I was caught totally unawares by the plot twist in this first novel of the series and I'm definitely curious to see where things go from here.