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essinink 's review for:
American Spy
by Lauren Wilkinson
"I was a special agent in the FBI from 1983 to 1987, and in that time the CIA hired me twice as a temporary contractor, the phrase they use for spy. That's how I met your father."
This is another book that sounds like a thriller on the jacket description and is actually an internal genre story. Sure, the thriller framework is there, but it's secondary, and if you're looking for nail-biting tension you'll be disappointed.
Five years after leaving the FBI, Marie Mitchell's time runs out. An armed man invades her home in the middle of the night, forcing her to flee to Martinique with her two young sons. With the future suddenly uncertain, Marie realizes that it's time to come clean about her past. American Spy is her confession, a tell-all story of ambition, power, and disillusionment. Through nonlinear retrospective recollection, Marie tells her sons about her childhood, her close but contentious relationship with her sister Helene, her frustrated career in the FBI, and finally her involvement with the CIA in Burkina Faso.
My greatest difficulty with this book is the writing style. The passive, telling-narration sapped tension from the greatest scenes; frequently I found myself dozing. After the home invasion in the first chapter, the narrative pace slows to a crawl. We learn about her past boyfriend, schoolyard fights, absent parents, etc. Marie doesn't start her work for the CIA until more than halfway through the book, which is a long time to be wondering why all these people and details are relevant, but by then I was committed.
I wanted to like this one. Marie is a black, female FBI agent in the 1980s with ambition stymied by the society in which she lives. She wants success, and she doesn't want to sacrifice her self respect or sell-out to get it. As cynical as she thinks she is at the beginning of her journey, there's a naivete that dogs her. It should have been fascinating, but unfortunately, the delivery is limp.
Still, it's not a bad debut, and I'll keep an eye on Wilkinson's work.
2.5* rounding down for boredom. (Which may not be fair, but it is honest.)
This is another book that sounds like a thriller on the jacket description and is actually an internal genre story. Sure, the thriller framework is there, but it's secondary, and if you're looking for nail-biting tension you'll be disappointed.
Five years after leaving the FBI, Marie Mitchell's time runs out. An armed man invades her home in the middle of the night, forcing her to flee to Martinique with her two young sons. With the future suddenly uncertain, Marie realizes that it's time to come clean about her past. American Spy is her confession, a tell-all story of ambition, power, and disillusionment. Through nonlinear retrospective recollection, Marie tells her sons about her childhood, her close but contentious relationship with her sister Helene, her frustrated career in the FBI, and finally her involvement with the CIA in Burkina Faso.
My greatest difficulty with this book is the writing style. The passive, telling-narration sapped tension from the greatest scenes; frequently I found myself dozing. After the home invasion in the first chapter, the narrative pace slows to a crawl. We learn about her past boyfriend, schoolyard fights, absent parents, etc. Marie doesn't start her work for the CIA until more than halfway through the book, which is a long time to be wondering why all these people and details are relevant, but by then I was committed.
I wanted to like this one. Marie is a black, female FBI agent in the 1980s with ambition stymied by the society in which she lives. She wants success, and she doesn't want to sacrifice her self respect or sell-out to get it. As cynical as she thinks she is at the beginning of her journey, there's a naivete that dogs her. It should have been fascinating, but unfortunately, the delivery is limp.
Still, it's not a bad debut, and I'll keep an eye on Wilkinson's work.
2.5* rounding down for boredom. (Which may not be fair, but it is honest.)