Tag Archives: novels set in the Cold War

#BookReview ‘A Cold Wind from Moscow’ by Rory Clements #thriller #ColdWar

Eighth in the Tom Wilde World War Two thriller series by Rory Clements, A Cold Wind from Moscow takes a post-conflict step towards the Cold War. This is a tale of a top secret nuclear scientist, a South London criminal gangster and a Russian hitman. Rory ClementsCambridge 1947. Life is returning to normal for Professor Tom Wilde after the war. He is teaching history again at Cambridge while his wife Lydia is a medical student in London. On a freezing cold day, he stops at the greengrocer on his way to work. In the window is displayed a rarity; a perfect fresh peach. Wilde buys it as a treat for his son, Johnny, then goes to his rooms where he is expecting a visitor from London, a man he met once before during the war. But when Wilde opens the door, Everett Glasspool is dead with an ice-axe buried in his head.
This is a transitional story set at a time of post-war stasis as global political tension pivots to the Soviet Union. Daily life in England is difficult, in some ways harsher than during the war. And the Arctic-like weather doesn’t help. Wilde finds himself drawn back into security circles where there are old familiar wartime faces and fresh ones, such as his boss at MI5 Freya Bentall. Freya fears she has a traitor on her team and charges Wilde to follow three of her officers. Then a nuclear scientist, who has evidence about the leak of secrets, goes missing. The trail leads Wilde into London’s criminal underworld and also to his old friend Geoff Lancing who is now working at Harwell, the atomic energy research establishment. Who is selling nuclear secrets to the Russians? Is there more than one traitor? And can Wilde find the missing scientist before the Russian hitman?
The end is intriguing, setting up what promises to be another Tom Wilde book. A really pacy read. Very enjoyable.

Click the title to read my reviews of the other books in the Tom Wilde series:-
CORPUS #1TOMWILDE
NUCLEUS #2TOMWILDE
NEMESIS #3TOMWILDE

HITLER’S SECRET #4TOMWILDE
A PRINCE AND A SPY #5TOMWILDE
THE MAN IN THE BUNKER #6TOMWILDE
THE ENGLISH FÜHRER #7TOMWILDE

And from the Sebastian Wolff series:-
MUNICH WOLF #1SEBASTIANWOLFF
EVIL IN HIGH PLACES #2SEBASTIANWOLFF
INVITATION FROM A DICTATOR #3SEBASTIANWOLFF

If you like this, try:-
‘Blow Your House Down’ by Pat Barker
‘Wolf Winter’ by Cecilia Ekback
‘Invasion’ by Frank Gardner #4LUKECARLTON

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview A COLD WIND FROM MOSCOW by Rory Clements https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8E5 via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:- Barbara Erskine

#BookReview ‘The Partisan’ by Patrick Worrall #thriller #ColdWar #spy

The key protagonist in The Partisan by Patrick Worrall is a female Lithuanian resistance fighter who becomes a Cold War assassin. How nice to read a thriller set in the Baltic States, a fresh take on war and how to survive it. At the heart of the story is Greta, the partisan. I admired her, and feared her. Patrick WorrallAn ambitious timeline ranges from the Spanish Civil War to the Sixties Cold War as Greta turns from wartime fighting, one of the Three Sisters, to post-war vengeance tracking down the war criminals on her list and eliminating them. Greta’s story intersects in 1963 with Yulia and Michael, Soviet and English teenage chess champions respectively, and a Soviet plot to win the Cold War. The 1963 chess sub-plot got in the way. Greta is the fascinating character, I wanted to read about her. Her story is thrilling enough.
I couldn’t help but wonder if a more limited reach would help the story’s rhythm. The story jumps around a bit. In the first half I would prefer spending longer with each character to understand them, before the pace picks up as tension rises and point of view gets snappier. I wanted to read about Greta’s story in one long narrative thread instead of a timeline jumping between 1940s and 1963. I particularly enjoyed Greta’s interviews with journalist Indrė in 2004 and was unable to get beyond the jumping around when I wanted to settle in with one character. The character list is long with many similar names to remember – who is on which side, who is double-crossing who – and this took me out of the story.
I’m always partial to a good thriller and like to find debut authors, so I’ll be watching out for the next book from Patrick Worrall. It’s different, try it.

If you like this, try:-
‘The Diamond Eye’ by Kate Quinn
‘A Hero in France’ by Alan Furst
‘V2’ by Robert Harris

And if you’d like to share a link:
#BookReview THE PARTISAN by Patrick Worrall https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-5T8 via @SandraDanby