"Agent Zigzag" is an amazing story of one of the most important double agents of WW2. Eddie Chapman, small time crook, serial womaniser and chancer, is such an interesting character that his exploits are extremely colourful. To escape the police in England, he escapes to Jersey. But he is eventually captured there for another crime and is in prison during 1939 when the Germans invade. Narrowly avoiding transportation, he persuades his new goalers that he would be a highly useful spy for Germany, given his record on the mainland. So begins a tale of cross and double cross. He is trained by the German secret service (with many of whom he becomes friends) and is parachuted into East Anglia where he immediately gives himself up to the authorities. Again his talent of persuasion convinces MI5 that he can become a double agent and so is born Agent Zigzag.
Ben Macintyre has carried out some remarkable research with the files that were released to the National Archives in 2001 and contained a vast amount of records on Chapman's case. He also persuaded MI5 to declassify more files and talked to numerous individuals with knowledge of Chapman and his experiences. There is almost too much information to take in. But Macintyre tells a great story, especially when he relates the personal life of his central character. It is when he starts describing the background of the many individuals from opposing sides that the book gets bogged down. I found the first half of the book to be far superior than the second. His inclusion of too many verbatim reports need some judicial editing. But it did give me a terrific sense of how our secret service operated during the war and the character of the men who were involved. But apart from the tracing of radio traffic at Bletchley Park, I wonder just how much other intelligence work contributed to the ultimate success. Perhaps the creation of deceptions did make a difference and Eddie Chapman played a part.
It must have been forty years since I read anything by Graham Greene, so when I recorded the film version of "The End of the Affair" I decided I would read the novel first. A book that combines passion with religion is a heady mix. Maurice Bendix looks back on a wartime affair with Sarah that ended so suddenly, and tries to make sense of his recollections that filled him with love and hate.
The first half of book is as poetic as it is filled with spare yet heart wrenching prose that is as good as anything I have ever read. So it is a disappointment when we temporarily leave Maurice's first person narrative for a literary device that pales in comparison. But it here that Maurice is confused with how God has taken away the love of his life, and Greene gives us an intellectual, yet straightforward twist on the meaning of religion, including the catholic faith and rationalism. Both of which involve Sarah.
The latter's representative explains love to her as "The desire to possess in some, like avarice; in others the desire to surrender, to lose the sense of responsibility, the wish to be admired. Sometimes just the wish to be able to talk, to unburden yourself to someone who won't be bored. The desire to find again a father or a mother. And of course under it all the biological motive". Greene challenges us to think about what love is, and does it with beautiful writing. The story is also pretty good.
Once in a while I find a book that just glows with superb writing and emotional insight."The Small Hours" is one of those. Susie Boyt has created a wonderfully fragile character in Harriet Goodman, someone who will stay in my memory for a long time to come. Her fragility is mental, not physical. She is over six foot tall and I could not get Miranda Hart out of my head. There is something from her childhood that her therapist has been looking to unravel, but her sessions are over. What has helped is the large legacy from her deceased father. I guess that her inheriting did nothing to help the alienation from her mother and brother, something that hurts even more than it should.
Harriet's investment in a nursery school is a beautifully imagined piece in it's own right. There is much to feel good about, the vision Harriet creates, her brilliant young staff, the exceptional children. Only with Harriet there is always a sense of foreboding. Trying to understand her childhood and family are never far from mind. So it is not all sweetness and light, and you know from an early fast forward, the dream collapses.
The changes in time do the book a great favour, softening the blow,and Susie Boyt has given us a shortish novel that tugs at the heartstrings and warms the senses with her distinctively fabulous writing. I wish I could give it more than five stars.
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