Red Sparrow – Place of Treason – The Kremlin’s Candidate
RED SPARROW- PLACE OF TREASON-THE KREMLIN’S CANDIDATE A twenty-first century John LeCarre! That is how I would describe Jason Matthews, author of the recently published Red Sparrow spy novel trilogy. Rather than running Cold War operatives and double agents, Matthews situates his characters in Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin’s Russia, where Putin, not Stalin, pulls the Machiavellian […]
Old Boys
OLD BOYS For those of us who relish old-fashioned, sophisticated spy stories in the Ian Fleming or John LeCarre mode, Charles McCarry’s novels are always a treat. Old Boys, the latest (and final?) in his Paul Christopher series, displays all of McCarry’s cerebral talent. As his narrator comments midway through the book, none of the […]
Istanbul Passage
For Joseph Kanon, 1945 was a pivotal year, a time when world powers were transitioning into what would become the gray shadows of the cold war. Each of Kanon’s novels is set in 1945, although each takes place in a different part of the globe: Los Alamos, Berlin, Venice, Los Angeles, and now, Istanbul. Each […]