Helpful Score: 4
I've never read any of Furst's books before, and I'm not hugely familiar with the spy genre, but I enjoyed this. We follow the hero, Captain Alexander de Milja, from besieged Warsaw in 1939, to France as she capitulates in 1940, to Ukraine and a small desperate band of partisans battling both the Germans and the Soviets in the winter of 1941.
De Milja is an appealing character, a man who has accepted the fact that he will die at some point, but who doggedly works at every task his superiors set for him. He encounters many varied men and women, both enemies and friends, with each new identity he assumes. These secondary characters are all vividly drawn, often in very few words--the author has a gift for characterization.
The book doesn't really build to a climax; we simply move along with de Milja through two years of war and leave him as he gathers his resources and decides where to go next. The details of Europe at war and the character of de Milja are what kept me turning pages...the story itself is a little flat.
De Milja is an appealing character, a man who has accepted the fact that he will die at some point, but who doggedly works at every task his superiors set for him. He encounters many varied men and women, both enemies and friends, with each new identity he assumes. These secondary characters are all vividly drawn, often in very few words--the author has a gift for characterization.
The book doesn't really build to a climax; we simply move along with de Milja through two years of war and leave him as he gathers his resources and decides where to go next. The details of Europe at war and the character of de Milja are what kept me turning pages...the story itself is a little flat.
Helpful Score: 1
Another brooding, dark WWII story by Alan Furst. You feel like you are there in Europe watching the whole story develope.
