Christopher's Ghosts

There are few characters in Western literature outside of Candide who suffer as much as Paul Christopher. His first love is killed by the Nazis, his mother is kidnapped by Reinhard Heydrich and disappears for fifty years, his father is murdered by the Communists and his wife betrays him. His own career is no better. He is wounded on Okinawa, friends are murdered, when he discovers the real assassins of JFK, his friend arranges for him to be captured by Red China where he spends ten years in solitary confinement. Throughout his ordeals, he never yields to self pity. He forges ahead with his principles intact. Mr. McCarry's Paul Christopher novels are a hymn to Kipling's Gods of the Copybook Headings. The result is that when Christopher has the opportunity for a little payback, the result is immensely satisfying. Christopher's Ghosts is divided into two parts. In the first, we have the haunting tragedy of Christopher's first love. Mr. McCarry manages to evoke the tensions of Nazi Berlin while simultaneously recounting Christopher's tender teenaged romance with a lovely young German girl who has a Jewish grandparent. We also come to know a monstrous SS interrogator with an interest both in the young woman and in the Christopher family. The second part of the novel occurs about twenty years later when Christopher finds and hunts down the interrogator, now working for East Germany. The ending, abrupt and efficient, is perfect. As with all of McCarry's novels, there is not an excess of violence, but the mood and the setting, which reminds me quite a bit of Alan Furst's writing, create a tension that keeps you turning the pages. Mr. McCarry is the master of the espionage novel, without the transparent gimmicks and stupid moral equivalence that you find in Le Carre.

Christopher's Ghosts is an attempt to tell how master spy Paul Christopher got the to be way he is--that is to say, how he acquired his suit of armor. It's a deft attempt that begins in late 30s Berlin as the explosive force of WWII gathers. The historical figure of Reinhard Heydrich adds a touch of pure evil to compliment the more human cast ranged on either side of the Nazi divide. This primarily includes Stutzer, Christopher's nemesis, who does his bully work for the Gestapo without qualm, then switches post-war to the Russian side without losing anything but his testicles. Throught the narration, McCarry writes sweetly and convincingly of the Berlins he obviously knew well. With only minor qualms of credibility, he brings the story to a full and satisfying conclusion. Echo Five

In Christopher's Ghosts, veteran spy thriller author Charles McCarry takes the reader back to Paul Christopher's early days as youth in Berlin with his American father Hubbard and beautiful German mother Lori. The first half of the book is taken up with Christopher's passionate youthful romance with 'Rima' in the days immediately before WW II. Rima is the daughter of a renowned Jewish surgeon who has been ruined by the Reich (although not technically a Jew under that regime's twisted laws). At the same time his mother attracts the attention of SS leader Reinhard Heydrich. Lori uses this relationship to help protect her family - up to a point. The second part of the book picks up in 1959. Christopher is now a crack agent for the fledging US intelligence service. McCarry sends Christopher and the readers back to Cold War Berlin. The setting is shortly before the Wall goes up and Christopher is on a mission that dually serves his own ends as well as broader American interests. McCarry uses Christopher's experiences to explore the uses of physical and psychological torture and its impact on torturer and victim. In doing so he holds a mirror up for the contemporary reader, not in a heavy-handed way, but one is led to uncomfortable reflections about the capacity of humans to inflict unspeakable suffering in what the torturers perceive as a good cause. McCarry's newest effort satisfies more than his recent (and somewhat fantastic) Old Boys. If it falls short of his classic Tears of Autumn: A Paul Christopher Novel, well that's the price of writing a great novel in one's early days as an author. Christopher's Ghosts carries the reader back to the fear-filled days of the Reich in the fullness of its powers as well as the relentlessly gray days of Cold War deprivation in East Berlin. Highly recommended, especially for fans of the spy genre. There is action here to satisfy the thrill-seeker, but McCarry also delivers political intrigue and personal introspection.

This is the 5th book I've read that was written by Charles McCarry. Others are The Miernik Diary, Shelley's Heart, Old Boys, and The Tears of Autumn. I have thoroughly enjoyed all five. I feel I know the Christopher family well and look forward to more of Mr. McCarry's books. All of his books are easy to read, kept my interest through every page, and made me reluctant to put the book down when I had to go to work, etc.! The stories are exciting.

Shelling out $[...] for a hardcover is not something I'm likely do unless I really know an author, or I hear amazing things. Well, many friends have been keen on McCarry for a long time, claiming he's one of the top writers of espionage, suspense/thriller fiction and most definitely in the same literary league with John LeCarre, Alan Furst, Eric Ambler and Ken Follett. I figured this was the one to jump on the bandwagon for after I googled it and read amazing reviews from every paper I looked at. Then I bought said book. Today. (Well, yesterday- it's 1:10). And I finished it- today. So while work may be hell tomorrow- I'm going to tell you- read the reviews if you don't trust me, but treat yourself to this book. McCarry's nuanced, at times poetic, writing style, his ability to create real, flesh and blood characters who will move you, and his fast-paced, taunt storylines, put him at the top of the list for craftsmanship and inventiveness. If Christopher's Ghosts ended at the conclusion of part one, it would stand -- existential climax notwithstanding -- as a brilliant novella of real life and human values confronting Orwellian evil. A teenage Paul Chriistopher, finds himself and family at the mercy of the Nazis' relentless surveillance of and interference in every aspect of citizens' lives, its determination to enforce a manufactured hierarchy of racial purities, its thought-control justice system and brutal, lawless enforcement -- is based in fact allows the novel to transcend all speculative cliché. Readers are offered a chillingly credible picture of a society overwhelmed by tin gods, pointless rules, and paranoia, a world where the expected meritocracy is turned on its head and anyone with a uniform can give life-or-death orders. The book's second half fast-forwards to the Cold War, which finds Christopher a veteran CIA operative on the trail of one of his ghosts. Straying far off the CIA reservation (McCarry, who worked for the CIA himself as an inteligence operative who operated under deep cover, cloaks that agency under the nickname "the Outfit"), Christopher is out to settle a personal score with an escaped SS monster who's now in league with the KGB. This half of the chronicle wants the heartbreaking grace of the background chapters. Very likely that's intentional. McCarry's delivery here pales only by comparison (owing mostly to the relatively truncated narrative), and it suits the perspective of an older Christopher's wearily jaded outlook. And if the CIA's methods remind you of SS tactics, Christopher himself doesn't seem to notice. TIME says of McCarry, "There is no better American spy novelist." I tend to agree.