BOOK REVIEW: THE RUSSIAN DIPLOMAT’S WIFE
By Ken Dekleva
Reviewed by Neal A. Pollard
The Reviewer – Neal A. Pollard is a associate at Management Dangers Group and was the lead cybersecurity government for a worldwide Swiss financial institution. Previous to becoming a member of the non-public sector in 2011, he spent 18 years within the US counterterrorism neighborhood, as a protection contractor and an intelligence officer. In 1996, he co-founded a counterterrorism company, bought in 2006 to Blackwater’s holding firm. He’s engaged on his first novel “Odd Spies,” a narrative of Silk Street gastronomy and nuclear terrorism.
REVIEW: Ken Dekleva’s third novel, The Russian Diplomat’s Spouse, is ostensibly a spy novel set in Vienna. I say “ostensibly,” as a result of at coronary heart it’s a love story of two spies. It’s additionally a narrative that explores the core component of espionage and intelligence operations: the extreme private bond between a case officer and the agent she or he handles. This is a component sadly misplaced in lots of modern spy novels, which go for the shoot-em-up adrenaline dumps of explosions, assassinations and automobile chases. Make no mistake: having a clandestine assembly to gather vital secrets and techniques with world safety implications, from an asset residing two lives and risking each, all whereas attempting to suppose via and handle the million issues that may go fallacious – that may nudge the adrenal gland, too, with out explosions or weapons. However extra importantly, compelling fiction explores the issues of human nature – misplaced belief, emotion over logic, performing towards one’s self-interest for an obvious “higher good” – and prompts the reader to ponder “this might be me, what would I do?” A spy novel must be completely fitted to this exploration.
Dr. Dekleva’s novel does supply a number of murders and motion scenes, however it devotes extra rewarding time to the human drama that lies on the middle of espionage. And as a working towards psychiatrist and former U.S. State Division diplomat, Dr. Dekleva masters this side as he tells his story. Thus, it was no random option to set the story in Vienna, referred to as each the town of spies and the town of the famed psychiatrist Sigmund Freud. Vienna (and its myriad cafés) performs virtually as a lot of a personality because the people Dr. Dekleva created in his story, including ambiance and nuance to the characters’ actions.
The story opens with a CIA officer beneath non-official cowl, residing and working in Vienna with the cryptonym “Copernicus.” The belongings he handles function beneath cryptonyms of planets: “Jupiter” and so forth. Copernicus visits a favourite hang-out, the Leopold Museum in Vienna, to stare upon a Klimt portray titled (fittingly) “Loss of life and Life.” Whereas Copernicus research the portray, a lady enters, silent however seemingly troubled. The 2 of them alone within the room, Copernicus and the lady have interaction in an emotional dialog as Copernicus comforts the coincidental stranger. Their assembly was an opportunity encounter, however Freud believed there have been no accidents within the unconscious. The evocative nature of the Klimt portray would have touched one thing related in each of their hearts, because it drew them each to it. Such human connections will be the idea of the bond a case officer would attempt to forge, to develop and recruit an asset. Dr. Dekleva makes use of this nicely.
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Because the story unfolds, Copernicus and the lady stay in contact. However there’s one thing off about her. Copernicus detects a secret in her value exploring, as he learns of her connection to a Russian diplomat, presumably an undercover intelligence officer. What begins as a query of “who’s dealing with whom?” transforms right into a starker query of counterintelligence issues. Copernicus’s belongings begin dying, and the ranks of Russian, American, and Israeli intelligence providers become involved. Because the espionage comes into sharper focus, Copernicus and his “goal” fall in love: a recipe for tragedy (and, in actuality, a career-ender for a CIA officer, irrespective of canopy).
The novel has a number of flaws. The story timeline will be disjointed, accounting for actions throughout mere days then leaping ahead years. The novel doesn’t emphasize tradecraft or “inside baseball” of CIA operations, and this isn’t the kind of novel to search for it. Nonetheless, a number of parts are unrealistic, particularly the notion that CIA headquarters would knowingly settle for a case officer continuing in a romantic relationship with an asset. As soon as that disbelief is suspended, the plot in addition to the love story unfold extra naturally. A significant twist with Copernicus’s arc does trigger the reader to marvel the place the novel ought to finish. However finally, Dr. Dekleva’s decision is smart.
One final level value mentioning, that additionally distinguishes this novel from clichéd motion tropes: the “enemy” right here is human and sympathetic, not cardboard Bond villains. In truth, the adversaries are adversaries accidentally of the political techniques they have been born into (and selected to not betray). On this respect, Dr. Dekleva evokes the human component of espionage that John Le Carré captured so nicely in his Chilly Warfare tales, whereas avoiding the cynicism. Throughout the adversarial face-offs, as much as the ultimate decision of Copernicus and his real love’s destiny (which I received’t spoil), this novel hints at George Smiley’s reluctant perception “that secret providers have been the one actual measure of a nation’s political well being, the one actual expression of its unconscious.” The Metropolis of Spies’ most well-known psychiatrist would have had a area day with that.
EDITORS NOTE: For extra on this title – you should definitely take a look at The Cipher Temporary’s Cowl Tales podcast interview with the writer, Dr. Ken Dekleva.
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