The Amateur Spy [Hardcover]

I found this to be very slow going. The major part of the novel has the main character acting very much the amateur and takes his time doing so. Seems like he makes boo-boos that even we armchair spies wouldn't make. And the reading of his bumbling is just plain dull. The climax is exciting, but it takes a heck of a long while to get there.

After years working in the world's most dangerous spots as an aid worker, fifty-five year old Freeman Lockhart retires. He and his thirty-something Bosnian spouse Mila take residence on the island of Karos in the Aegean Sea.

However, on their very first night, three home invaders abduct Freeman. They demand he do their bidding. He is to go to Jordon to spy on a former aid co-worker Omar al-Baroody. If he refuses, they will publicly destroy him and his wife by revealing his darkest secret involving his spouse when they worked in Africa. Stunned, he travels to Amman while in Washington, D.C. Dr. Abbas Rahim plans a terrorist attack that ties back to Freeman's Jordanian mission.

THE AMATEUR SPY is a superb espionage thriller and the audience will show their appreciation by reading it in one entranced sitting. Freeman is terrific as the title character blackmailed into a scenario that is out of his skill level but failure is unacceptable as he knows the price. Fans will sympathize and root for him while watching him bungle his way through a dangerous mission in which he knows no matter what he does someone will die.

Harriet Klausner

I won't go into a full rehash of the story, as the publishing reviews and other member reviews have done that in great detail. Essentially, this is the story of a retired aid worker (Freeman Lockhart) who's recruited by a murky intelligence agency to perform some spying for them targeting one of his former associates, a Palestinian now running a charitable fundraising organization. Of course, the question Lockhart is to determine is if, in fact, that's really all his old friend is up to. As leverage, three agents from the unnamed agency threaten Lockhart's young wife while also threatening to reveal to her a secret from Lockhart's past he doesn't want revealed because he's afraid of how it will affect her.

Okay, I know that all sounds complicated; well, it gets even more so as the story progresses.

At the same time, in Washington, DC, an American doctor of Middle Eastern descent and his wife, whose daughter was killed in a passport screwup while overseas which may have been caused by delays due to her Middle Eastern last name -- or so the doctor believes -- find themselves involved in a plot to commit a terrorist act against a gathering of high government officials.

See what I mean?

There are some interesting ideas here: an "amateur spy" with absolutely no intelligence training or experience bumbling his way through an operation; the byzantine politics of the Middle East, with its various competing factions; the world of aid distribution and cease-fire monitoring.

Unfortunately, author Fesperman had so many balls in the air he ends up dropping several of them.

When we finally learn the identity of the agency that's behind his "recruitment", that entire thread of the story abruptly disappears. Somehow or another, the threat they posed to his entire lifestyle becomes an absolute non-issue. The parallel stories of Lockhart and the doctor and his wife are dependant on far too many incredible happenstances. Lockhart's wife Mila -- the motivating factor in all his actions -- is almost a cartoon character, a virtual non-entity, simply the "McGuffin" of the story (to borrow from Hitchcock). He acquires a gun, and then never does anything with it, including never getting any ammunition. Fesperman throws up beaureaucratic obstacles to a couple of characters' departure from Jordan that suddenly -- and for no discernible reason -- disappear when it suits the story's timeline for them to leave the country.

For me, the parts of the story dealing with the refugee world in Jordan and the parasites of various persuasions that feed from and upon it was very interesting, and earned the three stars I gave this book. But I don't think le Carre is in any danger of losing his throne in this genre.

› Go to Amazon.com to see all 13 reviews  3.2 out of 5 stars