Now this has MRB written all over it.
Bill Cage works for a DC-based PR firm and hates it. He
started out as a journalist, but one column killed that career. See, Bill grew
up an embassy brat (sort of like an Army brat, but his dad was in the State
Department’s Foreign Service) and lived in exotic locales like Vienna,
Prague, Budapest, and Berlin. His dad, now retired and living in Vienna, is a
confirmed spy novel aficionado – and the nut didn’t fall far from the tree on
that love. The both covet their collections of old spy novels.
It was in the early 90s that Bill, a journalist for the
Washington Post (or was it the Times?) interviewed one of his favorite authors,
Edwin Lemaster, who while being a highly successful spy novelist was also a
cold war era warrior. Actually, he was one of James Angleton’s 3 primary
operatives (code names headlight, blinker, taillight) on that ill-fated mole
hunt within the CIA back in the 60’s. In the interview, Lemaster admits that
most all spies consider being a double agent, to make the job more interesting.
The edited version of the article says Lemaster was a Russian spy, effectively
killing Cage’s cred with the clandestine arm of the CIA and, effectively, his journalistic career.
Fast forward to around 2008. Cage gets an anonymous note that
he dropped the ball on Lemaster and should’ve dug deeper. A clue is attached: a
cutout of a page from a classic LeCarre novel. The clue sends him back to
Vienna for a meeting with his dad, then a trip to a bookseller where the next
clue is delivered by old his girlfriend from his teen years in Vienna, and each was the
other’s first, if you catch my drift.
They follow more clues, more snippets from classic spy
novels, tracking Lemaster’s courier ring, all the while learning more about
each other and their inadvertent tangential roles in Lemaster’s passing of
information and his dead drops. Not only do they want to know if Lemaster really
was a double agent, they also want to know who is pulling Cage’s chain with all
these clues.
For spy thriller junkies like the MRB guys, this book is a
loving homage to the genre, tracing the genre from its beginnings all the way
to its heyday in the cold war. Deciding I needed to write down the names of
some of what are, at least to me, some of he more obscure titles, I kept a
pencil and paper nearby. On a whim, I thought I’d look at the back of the book
for maybe an index only to find the entire development of spy novels;
alphabetical by author and chronological by year – over 200 titles and over 40
authors. Needless to say, I photocopied the list and have it close at hand.
So, if you like spy thrillers, especially cold war era
tales, you must find this one. The slightly befuddled Cage and his now gently
frumpy old girlfriend are an engaging couple, each with a few tricks and
secrets up their sleeves. Especially revealing are the ‘come to Jesus’ revelations
by old spooks who, though retired, never really left the game and miss the
thrill. I’ve read two Fesperman books,
now this. Very enjoyable. I will find more . . . and sooner, not later.
ECD
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