The Secret Lovers, Charles McCarry, E P Dutton, 1977, 308 pp
My husband and I are continuing to read and enjoy this spy series. The Secret Lovers is the third one. Its title turned out to have a double meaning. Several characters are double agents. Many have relationships that go back a long way, including to the Spanish Civil War and even to the Russian Revolution. Everyone has secrets.
Paul Christopher, special agent of the CIA, is the protagonist in the series. To make things as confusing as possible, this one takes place earlier than the previous book, The Tears of Autumn. Paul is married to a psychologically fragile woman from a wealthy Southern family. Their love is strong but she is not doing well with being the wife of a spy who is continually going off to various European countries on dangerous missions about which he can tell her nothing.
The story is set in 1960. The Cold War is as cold as it always was. The operation that makes up the plot has to do with smuggling a novel out of the USSR, the author being in a Soviet prison. It was cool to have all that Russian literary intrigue mixed in.
I must say that reading The Secret Lovers was a test of my mental acuity and memory as I struggled to keep track of all the threads. I had to be in Paul Christopher's mind while at the same time learning some facts before he did. Forget all those games you see on-line to sharpen your mind. Just read Charles McCarry once in a while and you will stay sharp.
Nevertheless, and sorry to John le Carre, I think this is the best novel I have read about the toll that working in intelligence inflicts on the personal lives of its agents.
This sounds terrific. I want to read some quality soy novels. The Cold War seems to have provided such good material for fiction. The literary connections make this one sound a little different.
ReplyDeleteMcCarry was at one time a CIA spy so he knows his subject and lived to write about it.
DeleteGoodness, sounds like a workout for the mind for sure!
ReplyDeleteIt was but after I wrote that I started thinking how reading books and following plots is always a workout for the mind.
DeleteThat's so neat that you and your husband enjoy reading the same books. It's like a book club of two!!
ReplyDeleteIt must be fun for the two of you to discuss the novels once you've each read them.
Ha! Yes. I could never get him to go to a book club but he likes having one with me. Our discussions are fun and he is actually much smarter than some reading group members I know. What is also fun is when one has read it and the other one is then reading it and brings up something, the one who has read it first goes, "You'll see."
Deletepaul christopher meets james bond? i read the latter but never heard of the former... i'll give it a try if i find it... tx...
ReplyDeleteExactly and because he works with spies from other countries he actually could! The books are best found in libraries though there may be ebooks.
DeleteSounds as though you've found a treasure trove of a series for those who love spy novels. Your pleasure in them is obvious.
ReplyDeleteYes I have! I would never have heard of the author except he died and I read his obit. So many ways we discover authors and books.
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