JAMES WOLFF chats to Paul Burke about his two novels BESIDE THE SYRIAN SEA&HOW TO BETRAY YOUR COUNTRY, frequencies of conflict, spies are real people and what makes a literary spy novel.
BESIDE THE SYRIAN SEA: Jonas works for the UK secret service as an intelligence analyst. When his father is kidnapped and held for ransom by ISIS gunmen in Syria, he takes matters into his own hands and begins to steal the only currency he has access to: secret government intelligence. He heads to Beirut with a haul of the most sensitive documents imaginable and recruits an unlikely ally – an alcoholic Swiss priest named Father Tobias. Despite barely surviving his previous contact with ISIS, Tobias agrees to travel into the heart of the Islamic State and inform the kidnappers that Jonas is willing to negotiate for his father’s life. When the British and American governments realise they may be dealing with betrayal on a scale far greater than that of Edward Snowden, they try everything in their power to stop Jonas, and he finds himself tested to the limit as he fights to keep the negotiations alive and play his enemies off against each other. As the book races towards a thrilling confrontation in the Syrian desert, Jonas will have to decide how far he is willing to go to see his father again.
HOW TO BETRAY YOUR COUNTRY: Things are looking bad for disgraced spy August Drummond. In emotional free fall after the death of his wife, fired for a series of security breaches... and now his neighbour on the flight to Istanbul won't stop talking. The only thing keeping August sane is the hunch that there's something not quite right about the nervous young man several rows ahead - a hunch confirmed when August watches him throw away directions to a European cemetery seconds before being detained by Turkish police. A reckless August decides to go to the cemetery, where he meets a mysterious figure from the dark heart of the Islamic State and quickly finds himself drawn into a shadowy plot to murder an Iranian scientist in Istanbul. But nothing is what it seems, and before long August realises he has gone too far to turn back. As he struggles to break free from the clutches of Islamic State and play off British intelligence against their Turkish counterparts, he will find his resourcefulness, ingenuity and courage tested to the very limit of what he can endure.
James Wolff lives in London. He has been working for the British government for the last 10 years. His article for Crime Reads can be read here
Recommendations:
Edward Wilson Envoy
Alan Judd A Fine Madness
Len Deighton The Berlin Trilogy
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Music courtesy of Southgate and Leigh
Crime Time
Paul Burke writes for Crime Time, Crime Fiction Lover and the European Literature Network.
Produced by Junkyard Dog
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