Early one morning in West Berlin, a nervous courier delivers the handwritten manuscript of a dissident Russian novel to Paul Christopher. Minutes after the handoff, the courier's spine is neatly snapped by an impact with a passing black sedan.
Meanwhile, in Rome, Christopher's wife Cathy takes a famous film director as a lover to stir her husband out of the stoicism that defines his personality.
These two seemingly discreet events set in motion a spiral of operational and personal intrigue, leading Christopher from the caf├®s of old Europe to the front lines of the Cold War in the Congo. As he secretly arranges the publication of a novel that could bring the Soviet system to its knees, he races to identify the leak that compromised his messenger—and possibly the entire mission.
Since his reemergence with the publication ofOld Boys, Charles McCarry has been once again heralded as one of the select few espionage novelists who manages to break out of his genre to shine as a brilliant novelist in his own right.The Secret Loversis McCarry at his best: an exploration of the epic scope of "the great game," but also a riveting psychological portrait of a man ensnared by a profession that never failed to exert its insidious influence outside the professional boundaries—and that, like the facade of diplomacy that outwardly held the Cold War in check, could never contain its violent essence.
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"This is such an interesting and involving story I realized in the middle of the first paragraph that I read it about four years ago, before beginning to list my readings here. McCarry is a master at creating environment - physical, emotional, temporal - right up there with Alan Furst."
— Bob (4 out of 5 stars)
“The absolute best thriller writer alive.”
— P. J. O’Rourke“Mr. McCarry’s spy novels…are as much a part of our national literature as the works of Mark Twain, Raymond Chandler, and Ernest Hemingway and…belong on the shelves of anyone who thinks good books matter.”
— Otto Penzler, Edgar Award-winning editor and publisher“Paul Christopher…is an original…Stefan Rudnicki navigates the complex plot, establishing both time and place expertly. From West Berlin to Rome to the Congo, in love scenes or in clandestine meetings, Rudnicki makes it all real…Graceful writing that never misses its mark and a riveting performance by Rudnicki.”
— AudioFile“A good cat-and-mouse game, with a little sex and murder thrown in for fun.”
— Library Journal" I read this after the Miernik Dossier to get some back story on Paul Christopher. There's quite alot on his marriage to Cathy, most of it very irritating. The last part of the book makes it all worth it! It's got more twists and turns than Coney Island's Cyclone. "
— Harriet, 1/31/2012" The Secret Lovers: A Paul Christopher Novel (Paul Christopher Novels) by Charles McCarry (2006) "
— Kevin, 5/8/2011" Another great addition to the Paul Christopher series with some very interesting and engaging new characters. "
— Christopher, 3/10/2011" Another Paul Christopher novel. Paul meets one of his agents, who is then killed by a car in front of his eyes. He sets out to unmask the plotters and uncovers a tale of revenge that stretches back to the Spanish civil war. "
— Jen, 2/28/2011" The Secret Lovers: A Paul Christopher Novel (Paul Christopher Novels) by Charles McCarry (2006) "
— Kevin, 7/28/2010Charles McCarry is the author of ten critically acclaimed novels and nine nonfiction books. He is a former editor-at-large of National Geographic and has contributed dozens of articles, short stories, and poems to leading national magazines. His op-ed pieces and other essays have appeared in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post. For ten years he served under deep cover as a CIA operations officer.
Stefan Rudnicki first became involved with audiobooks in 1994. Now a Grammy-winning audiobook producer, he has worked on more than five thousand audiobooks as a narrator, writer, producer, or director. He has narrated more than nine hundred audiobooks. A recipient of multiple AudioFile Earphones Awards, he was presented the coveted Audie Award for solo narration in 2005, 2007, and 2014, and was named one of AudioFile’s Golden Voices in 2012.