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Widely recognized as the master of the historical spy novel, New York Times best-selling author Alan Furst takes listeners back to the early days of World War II for a dramatic novel of intrigue and suspense.
New York City, 1954. The Cold War is heating up, Senator Joe McCarthy is running a witch hunt for communists in America, the newly formed CIA is fighting a turf battle with the FBI to see who will be the primary United States intelligence agency, and the bodies of murdered young men are turning up all over the city.
On Detective Matt Jones's first night working Homicide in LA, he's called to investigate a particularly violent murder case: a man has been gunned down in a parking lot off Hollywood Boulevard, his bullet-riddled body immediately pegged as the work of a serial robber who has been haunting the Strip for months.
France, July 1944: a month after the Allied landings in Normandy, and the liberation of Europe is under way. In the Pas-de-Calais, Nathalie Mercier, a young British Special Operations executive secret agent working with the French Resistance, disappears. In London, her husband, Owen Quinn, an officer with Royal Navy Intelligence, discovers the truth about her role in the Allies' sophisticated deception at the heart of D-Day.
When she's not digging up bones or other ancient objects, Ruth Galloway lectures at the University of North Norfolk. She lives happily alone in a remote place called Saltmarsh overlooking the North Sea and, for company; she has her cats Flint and Sparky, and Radio 4. When a child's bones are found in the marshes near an ancient site that Ruth worked on ten years earlier, Ruth is asked to date them.
In 1912, John Wade and his brother, William - children of the American consul - were kidnapped off the street in Chungking, China, and raised in the house of Eunuch Chang, the city's master criminal. Twenty-five years later, John is the eunuch's most valuable ward, a trained assassin and swindler, and William has become a talented forger. On the brink of World War II, China is in chaos. When William betrays Eunuch Chang and escapes to central China, a place of ferocious warlords and bandits, John begins a desperate search to save his brother.
Widely recognized as the master of the historical spy novel, New York Times best-selling author Alan Furst takes listeners back to the early days of World War II for a dramatic novel of intrigue and suspense.
New York City, 1954. The Cold War is heating up, Senator Joe McCarthy is running a witch hunt for communists in America, the newly formed CIA is fighting a turf battle with the FBI to see who will be the primary United States intelligence agency, and the bodies of murdered young men are turning up all over the city.
On Detective Matt Jones's first night working Homicide in LA, he's called to investigate a particularly violent murder case: a man has been gunned down in a parking lot off Hollywood Boulevard, his bullet-riddled body immediately pegged as the work of a serial robber who has been haunting the Strip for months.
France, July 1944: a month after the Allied landings in Normandy, and the liberation of Europe is under way. In the Pas-de-Calais, Nathalie Mercier, a young British Special Operations executive secret agent working with the French Resistance, disappears. In London, her husband, Owen Quinn, an officer with Royal Navy Intelligence, discovers the truth about her role in the Allies' sophisticated deception at the heart of D-Day.
When she's not digging up bones or other ancient objects, Ruth Galloway lectures at the University of North Norfolk. She lives happily alone in a remote place called Saltmarsh overlooking the North Sea and, for company; she has her cats Flint and Sparky, and Radio 4. When a child's bones are found in the marshes near an ancient site that Ruth worked on ten years earlier, Ruth is asked to date them.
In 1912, John Wade and his brother, William - children of the American consul - were kidnapped off the street in Chungking, China, and raised in the house of Eunuch Chang, the city's master criminal. Twenty-five years later, John is the eunuch's most valuable ward, a trained assassin and swindler, and William has become a talented forger. On the brink of World War II, China is in chaos. When William betrays Eunuch Chang and escapes to central China, a place of ferocious warlords and bandits, John begins a desperate search to save his brother.
15 thriller masters. 1 masterful thriller! Former war crimes investigator Harold Middleton possesses a previously unknown score by Frederic Chopin. But he is unaware that, within it's handwritten notes, lies a secret that now threatens the lives of thousands of Americans. As he races from Poland to the U.S. to uncover the mystery of the manuscript, Middleton will be accused of murder, pursued by federal agents, and targeted by assassins.
Hugh Legat is a rising star of the British diplomatic service, serving as a private secretary to the Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain. Rikard von Holz is on the staff of the German Foreign Office--and secretly a member of the anti-Hitler resistance. The two men were friends at Oxford in the 1920s, but have not been in contact since. Now, when Hugh flies with Chamberlain from London to Munich, and Rikard travels on Hitler's train overnight from Berlin, their paths are set on a disastrous collision course.
Boston in 1775 is an island city occupied by British troops after a series of incendiary incidents by patriots who range from sober citizens to thuggish vigilantes. After the Boston Tea Party, British and American soldiers and Massachusetts residents have warily maneuvered around each other until April 19, when violence finally erupts at Lexington and Concord.
In one bloody night, three of Washington’s most powerful politicians are executed with surgical precision. Their assassins then deliver a shocking ultimatum to the American government: set aside partisan politics and restore power to the people. No one, they warn, is out of their reach—not even the president. A joint FBI-CIA task force reveals the killers are elite military commandos, but no one knows exactly who they are or when they will strike next.
"If Robert Littell didn't invent the American spy novel," says Tom Clancy, "he should have." In this spectacular Cold-War-as-Alice-in-Wonderland epic, Littell, "the American le Carre," takes us down the rabbit hole and into the labyrinthine world of espionage that has been the CIA for the last half-century. "Ostensibly a single novel, The Company can also be listened to as an anthology of cracking good spy stories," says ( Publishers Weekly).
Evan Smoak is a man with skills, resources, and a personal mission to help those with nowhere else to turn. He's also a man with a dangerous past. Chosen as a child, he was raised and trained as part of the off-the-books black box Orphan program, designed to create the perfect deniable intelligence assets - i.e. assassins. He was Orphan X. Evan broke with the program, using everything he learned to disappear.
Meet Jake Oliver. The day will come when he's one of the best cleaners in the business, a man skilled at making bodies disappear. At the moment, however, he's a 22 year old rookie cop, unaware his life is about to change. In a burning barn a body is found--and the fire isn't the cause of death. The detectives working the case have a pretty good idea about what went down. But Officer Oliver thinks it's something else entirely, and pursues a truth others would prefer remain hidden - others who will go to extreme lengths to keep him quiet.
One summer weekend in 1949 - but not our 1949 - the well-connected "Farthing set", a group of upper-crust English families, enjoy a country retreat. Lucy is a minor daughter in one of those families; her parents were both leading figures in the group that overthrew Churchill and negotiated peace with Herr Hitler eight years before....
In war-torn Yugoslavia, a beautiful young filmmaker and photographer - a veritable hero to her people - and a German officer have been brutally murdered. Assigned to the case is military intelligence officer Captain Gregor Reinhardt. Already haunted by his wartime actions and the mistakes he's made off the battlefield, he soon finds that his investigation may be more than just a murder, and that the late Yugoslavian heroine may have been much more brilliant - and treacherous - than anyone knew.
Slough House is a dumping ground for British intelligence agents who've screwed up cases in any number of ways - by leaving a secret file on a train or blowing a surveillance. River Cartwright, one such "slow horse", is bitter about his failure and about his tedious assignment transcribing cell phone conversations. When a young man is abducted and his kidnappers threaten to broadcast his beheading live on the Internet, River sees an opportunity to redeem himself.
When fifteen-year-old American Hailey Portman goes missing in Switzerland, her desperate parents seek the help of their neighbor, Finn Harrington, a seemingly quiet historian rumored to be a former spy. Sensing the story runs deeper than anyone yet knows, Finn reluctantly agrees to make some enquiries. He has little to go on other than his instincts, and his instincts have been wrong in the past - sometimes spectacularly wrong.
Hilary and Mark Bradley are trapped in a web of suspicion. Last year, accusations of a torrid affair with a student cost Mark his teaching job and made the young couple into outcasts in their remote island town off the Lake Michigan coast. Now another teenage girl is found dead on a deserted beach... and once again, Mark faces a hostile town convinced of his guilt. Hilary Bradley is determined to prove that Mark is innocent, but she’s on a lonely, dangerous quest.
From the New York Times best-selling author and the "modern-day master of the genre" (Newsday) comes a gripping novel of espionage and deception in 1938 pre-war Paris.
At the center of the intrigue is Hollywood star Frederic Stahl. September 1938. On the eve of the Munich Appeasement, Stahl arrives in Paris, on loan from Warner Brothers to star in a French film. He quickly becomes entangled in the shifting political currents of pre-war Paris - French fascists, German Nazis, and his Hollywood publicists all have their fates tied to him. But members of the clandestine spy world of Paris have a deeper interest in Stahl, sensing a potential asset in a handsome, internationally renowned actor.
Ranging from the high society of glittering Paris to film set locations in far-away Damascus and Budapest, Alan Furst's new novel confirms his status as a writer whose stories unfold "like a vivid dream" (The Wall Street Journal).
This is my first introduction (other than by reputation) to Alan Furst, and while the novel was interesting and well-researched from a historical perspective it just wasn't a great spy thriller. Perhaps, I was hoping Mission to Paris would be grittier, but it seems like Furst was more interested in telling this pre-WWII spy novel in the tone and style of a Cary Grant/Gary Cooper movie script.
Stahl is a pawn in a political/spy/war game between big power; a lover of a lot of attractive and dangerous women; a reluctant hero, a smoldering spy. Yeesh. It wasn't THAT over-the-top, but it just wasn't what I expected. Predicable, and almost throw-away, but still enjoyable. Mission to Paris is a good vacation or beach read, just not a spectacular spy novel.
The narration was dynamic. David Gerroll, like Furst himself, pays attention to the details.
26 of 28 people found this review helpful
This is not Alan Furst's best novel, by any stretch. The plot and the characters are good but not unexceptional and, if it's not wasted money to buy this book, you probably will be able to put it down long enough for convenience breaks.
I enjoyed Daniel Gerroll's reading very much. He doesn't act out the characters and scenes although he gives each character a different voice. What was unexpected and a great delight is to have the impression, very often, of hearing Peter Sellers' Pink Panther in many of the dialogues. Same tone, same inflection, same way to end a sentence by letting it die down.
6 of 7 people found this review helpful
I read the reviews of this novel and wondered whether or not I would like it. What finally made me choose to buy it was the reference to Cary Grant. In my view this is better than a Cary Grant feature. I like Cary Grant yet this is better than any feature film of Cary Grant. I only wish he had been able to do this work on film. This is a feel good to be an American book and I love it! I think the best characteristics of being an American are noted here in this story. I enjoyed this book. It made me feel so grateful to be an American living in America!
2 of 2 people found this review helpful
Alan Furst is one of very few authors whose books I automatically read as they are published, without waiting for either professional or readers’ reviews. I’ve yet to be disappointed, and his newest, Mission to Paris, is among his best works. 1938 Europe is a frightening place as the continent inexorably moves to war. It is scary for the participants, but darker for Furst’s readers because we already know what happens. Furst excels as a mood painter and as a chronicler of ordinary people caught in a history not of their choosing. Their reactions and the roles they chose to play, are as varied as human existence. One finds Furst’s novel interspersed with heroes, opportunists, venal and terrifying people, as well as the naïve. While Furst’s 1938 Paris is meticulously researched, he does not dwell on the historical, perhaps because we already well know the history (e.g., Hitler’s annexation of Austria and Czechoslovakia, Chamberlain’s appeasement at Munich, and Krisallnacht in Germany). But he skillfully melds events into the thread of his story. Mission to Paris, while having an exciting plot, is not a thriller or page-turner in the sense of, say, a Daniel Silva story, but it is intense and suspenseful enough. This is a most enjoyable book, easy to read, but worthwhile from a literary standpoint.
5 of 6 people found this review helpful
[Darwin8 pretty much nailed it with his review.]
The atmosphere and mood of 1930's Paris is expertly set up by Furst (almost noir-like, if noir were a decade earlier), making it a voyeuristic pleasure to follow Frederich as he winds through the streets of pre-war Paris, attending clandestine "meetings" and social events. Instead of rock-em-sock-em action, Furst relies almost solely on tension, cleverly tightening the plot, loosening up the facades, twisting the connections and motives. And while there wasn't much action, the over all tension was palpable, and the hook-ups between debonair Frederich and the femme-fatales were tres sexy.
A predictable basic plot and cast of cliched characters, adds to the slow overall feel, but the novel actually moves at a fairly good pace and contains some interesting history. Still, it felt lackluster and plodding at times, and lost my attention. The smooth easy-on-the-ears voice of Daniel Gerroll, his ability to create such mood, and perfectly interpret the characters, made the listen enjoyable enough to finish. One of those that you pick up in paperback, read, then stack horizontally on a lower library shelf.
11 of 14 people found this review helpful
This book may be more like a summer read for the aficionado of Spy novels; I wouldn't know, because I rarely read them, mostly because I too often get lost in the intrigue. I tired reading "Tinker, Tailor..." and hated it; spent the entire read in a state of totally confusion. Even the movie confused me. So I tend to avoid spy novels.
That said, I kind of enjoyed this one...
I too was struck my the "Noir" style; and how very "Cary Grant" it was.
I thought there were some flaws in the logic at times. Seems to me that if you unplug phones that monitor conversations you are clearly alerting the monitors, and are begging for trouble.
On the whole I found the book enjoyable; I didn't have to work to keep up with the intrigue, or keep trying to sort out the characters and what they were about.
I enjoyed the feel of the place and the period. Yes, I agree, there were times when I thought it was a bit trite, and a cliched, but the cliches didn't dominate my experience.
Daniel Gerroll certainly brings it home; or to 1930's Paris. Strong, nuanced, quietly sophisticated and richly elegant in his interpretation with beautiful accents that sound native.
But, in the end, it didn't quite gel for me and I came away disappointed.
6 of 8 people found this review helpful
Sat in immediate prewar Paris it gives insight into the globalism dividing the a French people as they face the clouds of war. The chief protagonist is interesting. As an actor he is a little naive and had grown up in Vienna, becoming an American as a young adult. Nonetheless he clearly sees himself as anti Nazi. The story develops out of the threads of a German attempt to curry favor with him and the personal relationships he develops throughout his time in Paris. The story arc develops quite clearly and in a very interesting and believable way.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful
Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?
I did not find it worthwhile to read because I found the book to be uninteresting and too sexually extravagant for my taste
Would you ever listen to anything by Alan Furst again?
If this book is typical of his writing style, I would not listen to more of Alan Furst's material
What does Daniel Gerroll bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?
The narrator does an excellent job of giving each character his or her native accent.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful
This was the first book by Alan Furst that I have read and I will certainly read more. He has clearly well researched life in Paris in the late thirties and the atmosphere he creates is very authentic. The pace is leisurely in the beginning but the tension builds as the story progresses and the conclusion is unexpected but believable.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful
What did you like best about Mission to Paris? What did you like least?
I liked the subject matter, but I was hoping for something more dynamic, like Restless by William Boyd.
Would you recommend Mission to Paris to your friends? Why or why not?
Not really - story was just not that compelling.
What aspect of Daniel Gerroll’s performance would you have changed?
N/A
Do you think Mission to Paris needs a follow-up book? Why or why not?
no.
Any additional comments?
Even though I listened not long ago, the story has faded from my mind. Not a keeper.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful