Collected Miscellany

Red to Black by Alex Dryden seems to be clearly aiming for the blend of current events and espionage made famous by John Le Care but Dryden adds in a large dose of love story.

It also has the feel of an indictment of Vladimir Putin’s Russia, and a castigation of the West’s response, in fiction form. Put it all together and it makes for an interesting read; some of it works very well other aspects less well.

Here is a video trailer for the book:

For the more textual among us here is the blurb:

Finn is a veteran MI6 operative stationed in Moscow. In the guise of an amiable trade secretary, he has penetrated deep into the dangerous labyrinth that is Russia under Vladimir Putin to discover some of its darkest secrets, thanks to a high-level source deep within the Kremlin.

The youngest female colonel in the KGB, Anna is the ambitious daughter of one of the former Soviet Union’s elite espionage families. Charged with helping to make Russia strong again under Putin, she is ordered to spy on Finn and discover the identity of his mole.

At the dawn of the new millennium, these adversaries find themselves brought together by an unexpected love that becomes the only truth they can trust. When Finn uncovers a shocking and ingenious plan—hatched in the depths of the Cold War—to control the European continent and shift the balance of world power, he and Anna are thrust into a deadly plot in which friend and foe wear the same face. With time running out, they will race across Europe and risk every-thing—career, reputation, and even their own lives—to expose the terrifying truth.

For my take see below.

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I have to admit, I was shocked to find out that National Review editor Rich Lowry had co-written a novel.  I just didn’t picture him as the novel writing type.  Of course, he had the help of literary agent Keith Korman.  But still a surprising project. For thos unfamiliar with the book here is the PW set up:

Unlikely hero Peter Johnson, a mildly buffoonish writer working for the Crusader, a left-wing magazine, is recruited by CIA agent Stewart Banquo for the assassination of a top Iranian nuclear scientist. Banquo figures no one would ever suspect Johnson, known for his drunkenness and willingness to take a bribe, to be working for the CIA. Johnson, who accepts the job for a variety of reasons, heads off to Iran. A series of double crosses lands Johnson in the hands of the Iranians and sets up the rest of the plot involving a chillingly plausible terrorist attack.

And so my curiosity piqued, I decided to give it a read.   Banquo’s Ghosts turned out to be a entertaining thriller with a distinct political style to it.  This part is not surprising.  In many ways Lowry is following in the footsteps of the man he succeeded at NR: William F. Buckley; who wrote a number of espionage thrillers with strong contemporary political undercurrents.

For more see below.

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Micah Dalton, the lead character in David Stone’s series of espionage thrillers, is a stone cold killer (excuse the pun).  And the job is starting to wear on him.  At the start of Stone’s latest book, The Venetian Judgment, Dalton – a CIA “cleaner” whose connection to the agency is a little nebulous at present – is snuffing out the last remnants of a Serbian mafia gang that shot the women he loves and sent her into a coma.  He is intent on following this revenge until the bitter end even if, and maybe preferably, if it means his own end as well.

But instead he finds a catharsis of sorts and throws himself into a new case.  Accusations of treason and treachery are once again bringing chaos and destruction to the clandestine services section of the CIA.  A retired and beloved code-breaker has been murdered in a particular gruesome fashion.  And Dalton’s superior, head of clandestine ops, Deacon Cather is under suspicion of being a mole. Meanwhile, Dalton’s old nemesis Kiki Lujac is either dead or at the center of this new conspiracy.

To solve the mystery Dalton will have to survive long enough to find the answers.  Doing so will take him from Venice to Greece, Turkey, and eventually back to Langley. The answers are tied up in the seemingly ancient history of the Cold War, but they will have deadly repercussions if left unchecked.

Fans of Stone and Dalton will enjoy the latest adventure with its typical blend of action, intrigue, violence, and tongue-in-cheek type gallows humor.  The plot is a bit convoluted, but it is an entertaining read and there is a thread of political commentary running throughout for those who understand the debates involved.

More below (including “spoilers”).  Read the rest of this entry »

How much violence and brutality is too much and how much adds a entertaining sharp edge to a thriller?  This is not an easy question to answer unless you are one of those people on the extremes who enjoys either none at all or an unlimited amount.

It is also tricky because it depends on both the reader’s tastes and the author’s skills. Some authors can make a violent story darkly beautiful while some make the same level of violence seem over-the-top.

As you might have suspected, I bring this up in relation to the David Stone thriller series featuring Micah Dalton.  I reviewed the first book (The Echelon Vendetta); just finished the second book (The Orpheus Deception); and I am planning to tackle The Venetian Judgment soon.

This is an often violent, and at times gruesome, series.  Stone seems to like villains whose souls are twisted beyond recognition and who therefor do some very nasty things.  The hero must both escape being given this treatment, but also stop a larger threat to US national security.

This time it involves some sort of chemical weapon, a stolen tanker, a former colleague sent to the infamous Changi prison in Singapore, and Dalton’s Balkan crime lord nemesis.

Stone manages to pull all these threads together and weave a suspenseful, action filled, and entertaining plot.  I found the second book had a consistent vibe of black humor which I enjoyed but, like many in the genre, it is quiet violent and often strains credibility.  It also barely qualifies as a stand alone work.  If you haven’t read the first book it is difficult to fully enjoy this one.

Further thoughts below.  Read the rest of this entry »

2009 seems to be the year of the thriller for me.  Once I got started with the genre I just kept finding more to read.  My latest in this vein is a series by David Stone featuring Micah Dalton.  The first in the series is The Echelon Vendetta.

There is a lot going on in this often violent, and at times gruesome, espionage thriller and it isn’t easy to capture it all.  I found the most succinct and accurate summation at Entertainment Weekly of all places:

When a mission goes awry in David Stone’s The Echelon Vendetta, the CIA calls in Micah Dalton, a ”cleaner” who dispassionately mops up the mess. But then a friend and fellow agent dies in an apparent suicide and the pal’s family is found hacked to death. As he follows the trail from Tuscany to London to CIA headquarters to the Rocky Mountains, Dalton encounters government spooks, Native American mysticism, hallucinogens, and gruesome violence with which he seems creepily comfortable. But Stone’s unsettling tale keeps losing momentum, due to his nasty habit of interrupting the action with poetic travelogues at each new stop around the globe.

There are really three threads involved in this story.  The main thread is a rather straightforward, and well done, espionage story.  Dalton has to find out what is behind his friend and colleague’s death.  He eventually finds out that his mystery Native American killer is brutally murdering anyone connected to a mission gone bad on a project called Echelon.  Dalton tracks down the killer, and his true identity, as the bodies pile up.  The tension builds until the two confront each other.  Then Stone throws in a twist at the very end.

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I expressed some opinions about this on Twitter, but thought I would make it a full blown post of its own.

Marilyn Stasio reviews Olen Steinhauer’s The Tourist in the NYTBR.  She seems to struggle with it because it lacks the sort of straightforward plot you would expect of a international thriller.  After praising the central character Milo Weaver she drops in her frustrations:

The only drawback to this warm close-up of the protagonist is that it skews the novel, rendering it more of a character study than a full-bodied espionage novel. There’s plenty of plot, but it’s messy rather than complex; and while the cast is thickly populated with career spooks from France, Russia, China, Sudan and components of the former Yugoslavia, few of them develop into worthy adversaries, and their agendas are so murky that we’re not particularly anxious to get back to them.

I think this is true to a certain degree but besides the point.  I don’t think Steinhauer was attempting to write am espionage novel in the traditional sense.  I have been arguing instead is that he is attempting to use elements of the thriller and espionage genre and yet write more literary novels.

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I will be honest.  I am an Olen Steinhauer fan. Have been since I picked up his first book, The Bridge of Sighs, some time ago (and started reading his blog as well).  His crime series set in an unnamed Eastern European country during the Cold War was in my sweet spot as a former grad student with a focus on the Cold War: great writing, interesting characters, an espionage/crime thriller with the Iron Curtain as a backdrop, what’s not to like?

But Steinhauer has put that series to bed and has started a new direction or at least a new series with The Tourist.

Here is the plot as outlined by the publisher:

Milo Weaver used to be a “tourist” for the CIA – an undercover agent with no home, no identity – but he’s since retired from the field to become a middle-level manager at the CIA’s New York headquarters. He’s acquired a wife, a daughter, and a brownstone in Brooklyn, and he’s tried to leave his old life of secrets and lies behind. However, when the arrest of a long-sought-after assassin sets off an investigation into one of Milo’s oldest colleagues and exposes new layers of intrigue in his old cases, he has no choice but to go back undercover and find out who’s holding the strings once and for all.

This book carried risk and reward. New is exciting but what happens when the author leaves a much loved series behind and starts a new project? Sure, it is still what I like to call a literary thriller, but what if Steinhauer stumbled on his first stand alone?  Made me a little nervous, I will admit.

Another element of pressure, and an opportunity to stumble, was provided by the pre-publication publicity – which has been known to trip me up in the past.  The publicity  put Steinhauer in the pantheon of great spy thriller writers like Le Carre, Deighton, Graham Green, etc. Not an easy label to live up to.

Well, as I noted earlier, I am happy to report that Steinhauer didn’t stumble but merely brought his talents to a different task. I am in no position to label him the next Le Carre etc. but he certainly has tapped into the same vein and talents that kept me reading these type of authors.

The Tourist is a great and thought provoking read for anyone who enjoys the thriller aspects of the espionage genre but prefers better – and more philosophical – writing than your average airport pick up.

More below.

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