Posts Tagged ‘Safe Houses’

‘Safe Houses’ by Dan Fesperman

June 14th, 2018

WHO: Dan Fesperman

WHAT: SAFE HOUSES, a novel

WHEN: Published by Knopf July 3, 2018

WHERE: The author lives in Baltimore.

WHY: “A masterfully constructed example of classic le Carré–style espionage fiction in which nobody triumphs.”
—Bill Ott, in a starred review for BOOKLIST

“A breathtaking, intricate international spy novel unnervingly on point for the #MeToo moment.”
—Julie Kane, LIBRARY JOURNAL

“Another winner, this one as fiendishly clever as it is richly entertaining.
“In 2014, 35 years after Berlin-based CIA worker Helen Abell went rogue to uncover a high-level agent as a serial rapist, she and her husband are murdered in their farmhouse on Maryland’s Eastern Shore—both shot in the face with a hunting rifle.
“Initially, it is assumed that the couple’s mentally ill 24-year-old son, Willard, committed the crime. But his older sister, Anna, believing him incapable of such an act, hires Henry Mattick, an investigator, to help uncover the truth. She is amazed to discover that her secretive mom was once a spy in Europe and may have been targeted in connection with her activities there.
“The book continues with alternating sections following Anna in the present and Helen in the past. In Berlin, the innocent but strong-willed Helen, 23, has the job of tending to four safe houses for the Company. During a surreptitious middle-of-the-night visit to one of them, she witnesses a man assaulting a young woman and stops the attack. Warned by her superiors to forget the encounter and stay away from the assailant, an operative code-named Robert, she continues her pursuit on the sly via a network of female colleagues who are well-aware of the man’s transgressions. Just as Anna will put her trust in Mattick, who once worked for the Department of Justice in Baltimore, Helen puts her trust—for a time—in her lover, Clark Baucom, a veteran operative with the manner of Robert Mitchum and weariness written into his DNA.
“Fesperman takes a risk in dividing the narratives so cleanly, but the strategy pays off when they converge, one story deepening the meaning and intensity of the other. Unlike some spy novels, this one never bogs down in gamesmanship, spy talk, or cheap reveals. It strives to be truthful.” –KIRKUS, a starred review

“Smart, sophisticated, suspenseful, and intensely human. One of the great espionage novels of our time.” —Lee Child

“Combines the gripping immediacy of a present-day murder mystery with the high-stakes sexy intrigue of a Cold War espionage thriller.” —Chris Pavone

. . . . .

FROM THE BEGINNING OF THE BOOK:

The older man sat down at the kitchen table in the back of the safe house and recited the words for a second time. His monotone made it sound like a lesson, or maybe an incantation—some spell he was try- ing to cast over his listener:

“To swim the pond you must forsake the bay. You may touch the lake, but you must never submerge, and you must always return to the pond.”

Jacket photo

Media Resources:
About the book and author | Author tour | Read an excerpt | Download the jacket | Download the author photo

Knopf. 401 pages. $26.95
ISBN 978-0-525-52019-1


To interview the author, contact:
Abigail Endler | 212-572-2015 | aendler@penguinrandomhouse.com