A Divided Spy

If you’re a fan of espionage stories, then you must have wondered what it would really like to be a spy, not in terms of the actual spying parts of the job, but the personal parts – what happens to relationships over time, and more important, what happens to one’s own sense of self as the result of spending years living a dangerous deception. Charles Cumming in The Divided Spy has captured the essence of the impact of spying on the character of a man who has some residual degree of humanity, a theme Cumming has fleshed out in both the protagonist, English Thomas Kell and his principal foe, the Russian Alexander Minasian, the man who was responsible for the murder of Kell’s love, Rachel Wallinger.

While there were excellent ancillary characters that Cumming used to tell his story, the primary action was between Kell and Minasian. Their dialogue is riveting. The story starts in a casino (not at a baccarat table), but at a roulette while as a British passport office employee, a gambling addict, predictably got in debt from which he could only extract himself by agreeing to provide real British passports to some terrorists. The main terrorist has the intent to do a mass murder in England is an English-born Muslim. After spending time fighting as a Syrian rebel, he has returned to England to carry the jihad there. He has adopted an alias, Shahid Khan. The Khan plan becomes central to the Kell-Minasian conflict, and you’ll have to read this great thriller to get those details.

A Divided Spy is Cumming’s eighth novel, but it’s my first. ECD has already favorably reviewed another Thomas Kell novel, A Foreign Country. I’m so impressed with his story telling that I’m going to hunt for another one of his novels to read in the very near future. St. Martin’s Press has a winner on its hands. I’m lucky to have gotten an advanced copy, and it is due to hit the shelves on 2/14/17.