Immagine dell'autore.

Charles Cumming

Autore di The Trinity Six

16+ opere 3,523 membri 263 recensioni 7 preferito

Sull'Autore

Comprende il nome: Charles Cumming

Fonte dell'immagine: Neil Cooper

Serie

Opere di Charles Cumming

Opere correlate

L' uomo dalla pistola d'oro (1965) — Introduzione, alcune edizioni2,461 copie

Etichette

Informazioni generali

Utenti

Recensioni

A strange one this for me. I read it quickly and it is a genuine page-turner, but somehow it lacks depth. Depth to the characters, depth to the events, depth to the background. It is one of the very few books where I think it could have benefitted from being longer!

If I could, I would have given this a 3.75, it's better than a 3.5, but not a 4
½
 
Segnalato
malcrf | 3 altre recensioni | Mar 23, 2024 |
(2022) Thought I would give this a try when I saw its sequel in library. Through the first 100 pages or so, I thought, I've read this book before and am sure I started it. The clincher was when one of the characters is revealed to give his spy operatives nicknames based on TV women detectives like "Cagney & Lacey" and "Killing Eve". I plugged on but soon got bogged down in the author's insistence on using 2 stories separated by 20 years and jumping back and forth by chapters. It soon became hard to continue as both stories weren't very interesting and concentrated on the main protagonist, Lachlan Kite . I kept at it and finally the story of 20 years ago involving Iranian spies and the Locherbie Flight 103 airliner bombing got interesting. This would have been a much better book if he had left out the current day story altogether, concentrated on the earlier one up to its ending. I would give this a weak 3 stars of 5.KIRKUS: Karma comes calling for a veteran spy.An eerie prologue set on Dec. 21, 1988, recounts the crash of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie from the perspective of Gaby, a young American passenger who doesn't survive. Cut to present-day London, where veteran intelligence officer Lachlan Kite receives a phone call telling him that his childhood friend Xavier Bonnard has killed himself. His phone is being tapped by a cadre of MI5 agents intent on ferreting out the significance of Kite's involvement with the mysterious Anglo-American intelligence group BOX 88. Though their surveillance is comprehensive, the agents haven't reckoned on Kite becoming the target of a surprise attack, but he's soon kidnapped and thrown into a cell by a group of determined Iranians led by businessman Ramin Torabi. Captivity becomes the catalyst for Kite to engage in a soul-searching reevaluation of his life and career. Going all the way back to Kite's adolescence, author Cumming lays the groundwork for the moral decisions Kite faces in his intelligence career. The unravelling of the events surrounding Xavier's suicide is a key component of this painful reminiscence. So are the aftermath of the Lockerbie tragedy and the subsequent shocking secrets surrounding BOX 88. Cumming keeps the suspense high; not only is Kite imprisoned, but his captors are threatening his pregnant wife and their family. The plot anchored in full-bodied portraits of a small cast of characters confronted with the inescapable way the political and the personal are entangled is intricate but coherent, taking readers down a chilling road of recent history, vividly depicted. The result is a believable plot undergirded by complex characters and profound questions.The gold standard in espionage fiction.Pub Date: Jan. 11, 2022ISBN: 978-1-61316-273-6Page Count: 400Publisher: Mysterious Press… (altro)
 
Segnalato
derailer | 13 altre recensioni | Jan 25, 2024 |
Main protagonist is English thriller writer Kit Carradine. By accident (or is it?) he gets contacted by mysterious man claiming to be from Her Majesty's Secret Service. He wants Kit to perform one-off task while on book tour in Morocco. Of course Kit accepts. I mean, he writes about the spies and is now given opportunity to do some spy work - what can go wrong?

Put into it as an ingredient a fact that beautiful lady in distress is involved and you have everything to start the romantic down the road to fight monsters, right?

Story is told from multiple perspectives - in one we follow Kit in his adventure and dealings with shady characters of the spy world; in second we follow Lara Bartok (lady in distress) giving report back to her commanding officer in HM Secret Service - it is interesting how her view of events not necessarily match what we see/hear from Kit's perspective; in third we are given grim details about the actions of rebellious popular group called Resurrection - people organized at first to just harass various extreme-right representatives (radio anchorman, TV show personalities and in general what today is called influencers - in majority of cases what you might call charlatans and demagogues) but that very soon turned to killing on a very large scale (their actions culminate with the siege and hostage taking in Warsaw). Now if you ask me these folks are nothing more than good old anarchists - rather naive approach that their initial actions (kidnappings and physical attacks) wont escalate into outright political violence is really ... stupid. Slowly all of these story lines start to cross and finally we get to the finale. No, won't write about the finale :) but gotta say it ends up as a cliche (if you read any of the spy books in your life).

One of the reviewers commented out that in almost every modern novel Russians are back as main antagonists and it gets rather boring the way world is portrayed - good/white (West) and bad/black (Russia). I guess it is just reflection of new polarization in the world but I find that need to constantly praise the forces on the side of the angels (whomever these angels are) is little bit dated and I expected more. That is one thing in which Le Carre (with all his official conservative views of the world) succeeds better than the rest - in his book after reading about all parties involved you just have an urge to wash your hands because you feel dirty.

And when it comes to anarchists - they were against every political system (hence the word) so as expected this Resurrection movement started life of its own when left without control. Raising hell for the sake of it in highly militarized civil police and under multitude of cameras and controlling systems seems a little bit - naive, right?

That aside book is really well written. As Kit explains about his own novels this one is in middle of Le Carre slow-moving stories and Ludlum's action adventures. Story does stall during the romantic parts with Kit and Lara but I take that as my subjective experience (all the romantic endeavors and lovers hesitation are not my cup of tea :)). While reading it I could not stop but draw parallels between Eric Ambler's works and this book.

All in all good story, but note that it is affected by current political views (resulting in rather cliche ending) which might not be to everyone's liking. So if you tend to over-analyse you might not like it. If you read it to enjoy interesting story you will like it.

Recommended to all fans of spy stories.
… (altro)
 
Segnalato
Zare | 19 altre recensioni | Jan 23, 2024 |
This is a well-plotted espionage thriller set in the not too distant past, tracking down a 'genocidaire' from Rwanda by an older and wiser spy.

To start the story we go back to 1994 with Lachlan Kite working in Rwanda as a dropping off point. Kite has carried money out there to fund the 'snatch' but of course, things go wrong and instead of catching Bagaza, he is killed and his girlfriend, Grace Mavinga escapes, travelling over the border and becoming someone else.

Years later, she reappears alongside Duval, a french spy gone rogue, and together they money launder. Box 88, the spy group that Kite works for, hears of her reappearance and sets up a plan to catch her, which they do. It sounds so simple but of course it is anything but.

The story is intricately woven with politics and personal views about America and the UK which does the job of setting the context historically and provides the space for people such as Mavinga and Duval to operate.

Successive British governments have actively encouraged anyone with a large enough cheque book to get it out in London and start spending. Dirty money washes through the construction sector, the hospitality industry, car dealerships, football clubs, you name it. Without it, the British economy would probably go into freefall.
p244

Ouch!

The dual timeline of 'then and now' allows Cummings to show how things have changed, characters included, but also spy tools and methodology. Kite in the present day is 50 years old and spends time with his wife and daughter. Not something he did in 1995, when as a young spy he was involved in the failed plot but this is a device that shows us how failure early on in a career can be stored away and rectified later on.

The book didn't have me sitting on the edge of my seat, chewing my fingers but it does have a page-turning quality where the 'chase' takes place over decades and where patience pays off.
… (altro)
½
 
Segnalato
allthegoodbooks | 3 altre recensioni | Jan 20, 2024 |

Liste

Premi e riconoscimenti

Potrebbero anche piacerti

Autori correlati

Walter Ahlers Translator
Eva Bonné Translator
Antonio Rivas Translator
Maia Figueroa Translator
Peter Barnaart Translator
Javier Guerrero Translator
Simon Vance Narrator
Morten Andersen Translator

Statistiche

Opere
16
Opere correlate
1
Utenti
3,523
Popolarità
#7,209
Voto
½ 3.5
Recensioni
263
ISBN
208
Lingue
9
Preferito da
7

Grafici & Tabelle