by Alan Furst
Part of Night Soldiers, book 7
First published 2002
Russian writer I. A. Serebin steps off a Black Sea freighter in Istanbul in November 1940. He has fled Nazi-occupied France, traveling under cover of an émigré organization based in Paris. This exile from a dying Europe faces his fifth war, but this time he has no country and no army to join. War finds him anyway. Hungarian master spy Count Janos Polanyi recruits Serebin for a British secret service operation targeting Germany's oil supply from Romania. The mission takes Serebin through the spy networks of the Balkans, from Bucharest's Athenée Palace to an Izmir brothel, from Istanbul's yacht clubs to Belgrade's river docks. He navigates sleazy nightclubs, safe houses, and anonymous hotels while fascist civil war rages in the streets. Serebin must operate in a world where oil has become the blood of victory, and survival depends on cutting Germany's lifeline.
Genres: historical-fiction, 20th-century, military-fiction, espionage
Vibes: atmospheric, fast-paced, suspenseful
Tropes: fish-out-of-water, survival
Setting: Black Sea, Istanbul, France, Romania, Bucharest, Izmir, Belgrade
Period: 1940
237 pages · Hardcover · Weidenfeld