I read this book for the Mount
TBR 2018 Reading Challenge.
The World at Night
– Alan Furst
This thriller tells a spy story in Nazi-occupied Paris.
The hero, Jean-Claude Casson, is a semi-successful movie producer who is the
object of pressure from the Gestapo to get involved in counter-espionage action
against the British. At 42 years of age, Casson is the classic Furstian
protagonist: living a silly life until circumstance - such as living under a
malicious tyranny run by troglodytes – forces him to face the fact that he
won’t have any self-respect if he lets people push him around.
There is, as we’d expect, a love interest, the exotic
actress Citrine. But there is also duty to himself and his country. Furst puts
Casson through changes, from self-centered man about town to petrified,
hesitant spy. The missions remind one of the mess-ups and foul-ups in Somerset
Maugham’s Ashenden.
Like other novels of the Occupation of France (e.g., Dirty Snow, by Simenon), Furst’s
purpose and concern seems to be to get across the terrified, bleak atmosphere of
one of the most wonderful cities in the world occupied by terrible despots and
tormentors. Furst explores his favorite theme of ordinary people doing that
they can against tyrants and their willing collaborators.
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