Scan barcode
A review by persey
Jack of Spies by David Downing
2.0
I miss Berlin, that wonderfully evoked image of a city at war that was as much a protagonist of Downing's WWII spy novels as John Russell. I don't know if Downing got it all right, but it didn't really matter; I believed in it.
Belief is coming up short with the first book in his news series. Downing's new spy, Jack McColl, romps about on three continents and Downing likes to show off his research, which is at best perfunctory. So we get a lot of info dumps regarding the headlines of the day, tourist trips around the various cities (and he did get a lot wrong in New York), walk-ons by various famous and semi-famous people such as Agnes Smedley and Caresse Crosby (under her maiden name), and including McColl's medic in the Boer War, who was, wait for it, Gandhi, and the love-interest's college roommate, the future Mme. Sun Yat-Sen. Oh, sure. Moreover these are essentially 21st century characters who are supposed to have lived a century ago. Caitlin is unrealistically sexually active and gets a job as an editor at the famously misogynistic New York Times, while the Oxford-educated Jack uses such words as "Yep" and "Nope." In 1914? I think not.
The lazy writing continued with that fallback of hack spy writers, a series of unrelated short adventures and no over-arching plot. I'm giving this two stars only because I suppose the series will get better now that the war has started, if Downing can focus on one arena of action at a time. I'm not sure I'll be along for the ride, however.
Belief is coming up short with the first book in his news series. Downing's new spy, Jack McColl, romps about on three continents and Downing likes to show off his research, which is at best perfunctory. So we get a lot of info dumps regarding the headlines of the day, tourist trips around the various cities (and he did get a lot wrong in New York), walk-ons by various famous and semi-famous people such as Agnes Smedley and Caresse Crosby (under her maiden name), and including McColl's medic in the Boer War, who was, wait for it, Gandhi, and the love-interest's college roommate, the future Mme. Sun Yat-Sen. Oh, sure. Moreover these are essentially 21st century characters who are supposed to have lived a century ago. Caitlin is unrealistically sexually active and gets a job as an editor at the famously misogynistic New York Times, while the Oxford-educated Jack uses such words as "Yep" and "Nope." In 1914? I think not.
The lazy writing continued with that fallback of hack spy writers, a series of unrelated short adventures and no over-arching plot. I'm giving this two stars only because I suppose the series will get better now that the war has started, if Downing can focus on one arena of action at a time. I'm not sure I'll be along for the ride, however.