Alan Furst has published a new espionage novel, “Mission to Paris.” This one might as well have the words “beach book” written on it, for Furst has perfected the art of the historical spy novel.
This one, the 12th book in his “Night Soldiers” series, is set mostly in Paris in late 1938. World War II looms on the horizon. In France there are divergent views on the potential threat of a German invasion.
A movie star named Fredric Stahl has been loaned out by his Hollywood studio to make a picture in Europe. Stahl was born Franz Stalka in Vienna. He speaks fluent German, but he is certainly no Nazi.
He travels by ocean liner to France to star in a motion picture, “After the War.” At the dock, he is met by Zolly, the movie studio’s man in Paris and whisked away in a luxurious automobile.
Stahl lived in Paris before he became a movie star. He checks into the hotel then heads out to the city streets to rediscover his old haunts. The author’s appreciation for the atmosphere of this beautiful city is always worth savoring.
Our movie star is “walking slowly, looking at everything, he couldn’t get enough of the Parisian air; it smelled of a thousand years of rain dripping on stone, smelled of rough black tobacco and garlic and drains, of perfume, of potatoes frying in fat. It smelled as it had smelled when he was twenty-five.”
While things appear normal on the surface, the newspaper headlines are rather ominous. Stahl reads one that announces “German Divisions Prepare to March.”
Stahl is soon approached by a man who speaks to him in German and addresses him by his former name of Franz Stalka. He is alarmed to recognize this man as “Karl Moppel, his boss at the Austro-Hungarian legation in Barcelona, lo these twenty years ago.”
Our leading man had hoped to fulfill his contract and get back to California. Instead, he becomes ensnared in a web of Germanic intrigue. He reluctantly agrees to travel to Berlin to serve as the judge of the mountaineering film of the year.
Our sense of looming menace grows. Mysterious strangers lurk in the shadows. Before departing, Stahl met with an American named Wilkinson who gave him a large quantity of money to smuggle into Germany.
There was significant isolationist feelings in America in 1938. President Roosevelt recognized the growing threat presented by German militarization, but he had to be careful about providing even covert support to combat the rise of fascism.
When Wilkinson gives Stahl the money, he clarifies that “first of all, this is not government money. The USA doesn’t spend money like that, maybe it should, but it doesn’t. The money is, umm, donated? I guess that’s the word. The Department of State and the military spend a little money for information, but nothing like this.”
“Mission to Paris” has some familiar Furstian features: the gorgeous spy, the dangerous train journey, the murder, the border crossing via bribery, and our reluctant spy will find just enough time for a dalliance with a magnificently tragic woman.
You should probably take this one to the beach.
Vick Mickunas of Yellow Springs interviews authors every Friday at 1:30 p.m. and on Sundays at 11 a.m. on WYSO-FM (91.3). For more information, go online to www.wyso.org/programs/book-nook. Contact him at vick@vickmickunas.com.
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