From the Bookshelf of Espionage Aficionados…
Find A Copy At
Group Discussions About This Book
No group discussions for this book yet.
What Members Thought
Berlin just after the Second World War was a land of opportunity for hustlers and spies, with the economy in ruins and four occupying powers jostling for position. John Lawton vividly evokes the times with this tale of a Cockney burglar whose criminal career is interrupted when he is drafted into the RAF near the end of the war. Smart and resourceful but unsuited to military discipline, he is rescued from the guardhouse by a talent-spotting colonel and prepped for a career in espionage. Late-for
...more
A Troy book without Troy. But, yes, it deliberately uses the Leonard Cohen title, so there's New York first, then a lot of Berlin.
...more
Wilderness (Holderness) is a great protagonist -- orphaned kid from the East End who becomes a thief. A gift for languages gets him into the spy business, but he never stops stealing. Set in Berlin, late 40s through 1963. Black market four-sector Berlin morphs into Cold War Berlin. A key character witnesses Bergen-Belsen in '45 as a child. Engaging, well written historical fiction.
...more
Sep 07, 2013
Elli
marked it as to-read
Oct 28, 2013
Bell
marked it as to-read
Jun 11, 2014
Icy-Cobwebs-In-Space
marked it as to-read
Aug 01, 2014
Anders
marked it as to-read
Sep 29, 2014
Eric_W
marked it as to-read
Nov 02, 2014
KOMET
marked it as to-read
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
john-lawton,
mysteries-and-thrillers
Jan 09, 2016
Ralph Buddle
marked it as to-read
Mar 05, 2016
Wesley
marked it as to-read
Jan 17, 2018
Marija Korac
added it
Jun 26, 2018
Paul Craig
marked it as to-read
Sep 05, 2018
Francis Valletta
marked it as to-read
Jun 19, 2021
Lindsay Mouat
marked it as to-read
