Daniel Silva: The Order, Harper Collins, 9780008280833, C format paperback, available,

Summertime, thriller time and Daniel Silva is one of my favorite thriller writers. Luckily he has produced a new one for the summer, “The Order”, which is set in the Vatican and of course has Gabriel Allon as his chief protagonist. Apart from being the head spymaster at the Israeli intelligence, he is also a master art restorer. He had befriended liberal Pope Paul VII when he saved his life during an assault; his sudden death raises a lot of suspicion whether it was indeed a natural one.  Since an ultra-conservative, influential order seems to have connections into the highest offices of the Holy Church planning to gain the upper hand and the late Pope’s personal Swiss Guard has also disappeared,  Luigi Donati, the pope’ personal secretary and also a friend of Allon summons Gabriel to Rome to investigate.   They soon discover that a secret book of an apocryphal gospel which was hidden in the secret Vatican archives until it founds its way into the dead pope’s hand, has disappeared as well.  

Having studied a few semesters of comparative religious sciences myself,  I was fascinated and familiar with the academic doubts raised about the accuracy of the gospels still taught  by the Catholic Church and of the existence of apocryphal ones who are disregarded and would cast a somewhat different light on many teachings of the church. 

 Silva cleverly spins a complicated plot combining several  murders,  the secret dealings of the Vatican including the election process for a new pope  and the accuracy of the gospels still taught by the Catholic church. Silva’s author notes are particularly interesting and illuminating; had a fun time reading “The Order”.   

Curtis Sittenfeld: Rodham, 9780593230527, Penguin Random House USA, large format paperback, International edition

Hats off to Curtis Sittenfeld for writing such a fascinating tale of  what-could-have-been had Hilary Clinton not married charismatic Bill Clinton.  Feeling somewhat ambivalent about this book to begin with, I ended up feeling very enthusiastic about this clever novel.  It could have easily turned into a disaster by a less skillful author particularly since everyone knows the real life story of the actual Hilary Clinton and how her political career has turned out.  But Curtis Sittenfeld does a masterful job in imagining a life where Hilary walks out on Bill Clinton after dumping a promising professional start for him ending up living with Bill in Arkansas until  finding proof of his repeated infidelities before their  scheduled marriage. 

Taking some historical facts into account, Sittenfeld composes a fascinating fictional tale of the next forty years in Hilary Clinton’s political and private life which made me laugh out loud a few times and kept me hooked and surprised to the very end.  She explores the loneliness and steely determination needed by a woman when throwing her hat into the ring for high powered positions or how to this day women are judged so much more harshly than man when entering politics. 

Great narration and plot, loved the fictional development she invents for such prominent characters as Bill Clinton or Donald Trump. I will not reveal more since it would thoroughly spoil the fun reading this fictional narration of a sometimes very different Hilary Clinton but then again characteristic of the real life Hilary appear.

Andrew Wilson:  Death in a Desert Land, Simon & Schuster, 9781471173509, paperback

How I found out about this book I cannot exactly remember but it has provided delightful reading pleasures during the last week and is a perfect escapist summer read.  If you love Agatha Christie novels, particularly Poirot, this is your book.  

Agatha Christie is the star detective herself in this cleverly plotted novel set in Baghdad and Ur in 1928, loosely based around actual people and facts in Agatha Christie’s life.  Agatha is sent out to Iraq by British Intelligence officials to investigate the death of Gertrude Bell, the great traveller and linguist who had supposedly died of a drug overdose in Baghdad.  During her investigation she finds a letter Gertrude wrote but never mailed that she was afraid someone was out to kill her mentioning  that her murderer could probably be found at an archeological excavation site in Ur. Agatha packs her bags and heads for Ur where Leonard Woolley heads a promising archeological dig for the British Museum and is greeted by some very eccentric British and American visitors and helpers at the camp. When a murder takes place and Katherine, Woolley’s difficult wife, is accused of having killed Sarah Archer, the daughter of a wealthy American couple whom she greatly disliked and considered a rival, Agatha finds herself entangled in an explosive, dangerous situation forcing her to start her own investigation.  The plot is cleverly spun and in true Agatha Christie fashion naturally untangled at the end. Loved it!  

Andre Leon Talley: The Chiffon Trenches, 9780008342357, 4th Estate, UK, hardback

“The Chiffon Trenches” is a great title, it holds promise of serious fashion gossip about such heavyweights as Anna Wintour, Yves St. Laurent and Karl Lagerfeld and it does not disappoint!  The title certainly seduced me to read this memoir by  Andre Leon Talley who is now in his seventies,  one of the first colored style icons who made it into the high echelons of fashion, first working for the famous Diana Vreeland,  becoming part of Andy Warhol’s inner circle, landing the job of Paris bureau chief of Women’s Wear Daily with the notoriously difficult John Fairchild as his boss and finally reaching the absolute heights as creative director of Vogue with  Anna Wintour at the helm who everyone now knows as  the A class bitch  in  the movie “The Devil wears Prada” . . Talley had majored in French at university and was always drawn to fashion like a magnet.  At Vogue he became one of the most influential  men  leading an extraordinary high powered life, famous for his unusual dress style and a close friend of Karl Lagerfeld before he fell from grace.

I just could not get over the fact how the world of these incredibly rich people seems to revolve around nothing but fashion or creating an impression, what designer or what clothes to wear or which parties to attend all documented painstakingly by Andre in his candid memoir.  It is past and beyond me how much money is spent on couture clothes,( no matter how much creativity might have flown into their making) luxury hotels, holidays or other luxury items and how very little else seems to matter.  Some of his recollections literally made me shake my head at such decadence. The court of Louis XVI came to mind.  

Andre Leon Talley was raised in the South by his religious grandmother after his mother showed little interest in him; religion continued to feed his soul throughout his adult life particularly in his later years when things did not go so smoothly anymore and him being overweight became a serious issue in this superficial world.

“The Chiffon Trenches” provides a rare glimpse and a behind the scene account of what it was like to be associated with such fashion czars as Yves St. Laurent, Karl Lagerfeld, Oscar de la Renta, Halston, Gianni Versace etc.  Andre Leon Talley had his own demons to deal with and is very open about his struggles, the hurt and bruises he received in dealing with such highly egocentric people.  The world of fashion as it turns out is a pretty brutal and ruthless one, it was very entertaining to take a look at this snake pit.

Natalie Goldberg: The Great Spring,  Shambala, Boulder/USA, 9781611803167, hardback

Natalie Goldberg was recommended to me by a dear friend from my publishing days; I had never heard of her before or read anything by her.    “Writing down the bones” is her bestselling book on writing and creativity.  Natalie herself has been writing, painting, practicing Zen and teaching for many years living in Northern New Mexico but travelling the world as a student and teacher. 

“The Great Spring” is a brilliant collection of her essays about Writing, Zen and Zigzagging around the world and through life.  I was fascinated by her great spirit, wisdom, sense of humor and honesty when reading these essays over a period of three weeks, finding some of her experiences utterly thought provoking and others not speaking to me at all.  I admire people who ground their lives in daily Zen practice but it would not be my path. The book is divided into 5 sections: Searching, Wandering, Zigzagging, Losing and Leaping.   All essays are superbly written as one might expect of such a fine writing teacher:  whether it is her visiting Larry McMurty’s Texan rare books town (spoiler alarm: weird place!), her narration of loving memories of her Zen teacher who had passed away, her Zen practices, travelling in Japan, visiting Bob Dylan’s birthplace, losing a dear friend or trying to connect to a life in Palo Alto and the Dot.com crowd where her partner had launched a startup. 

What resonated with me the deepest was her discovery over the years that no matter how hard or hopeless your current situation, a great spring will follow after the cold of winter.  Something to behold  in these testing times or when going through a rough patch in one’s own life.

Scott Turow: The Last Trial, 9781529039085, Mantle/Pan Macmillian, Hardback, EBook available

I have considered Scott Turow to be one of the finest legal thriller writers ever since reading his masterpiece “Presumed Innocent” which stared Sandy Stern for the first time and left me completely hooked.  I feel the same way about  his latest novel, “The Last Trial”,  where Sandy Stern, now at age 85, argues his final case together with his daughter Marta, his partner now for many years in the legal firm Stern & Stern. 

The defendant is his lifelong friend Dr. Kiril Pafko, a Nobel Prize winner of Medicine, researcher and inventor of a ground breaking cancer drug.  He has been charged and accused of several crimes: altering medical data to get the FDA’s approval for the cancer medication, insider trading after selling stocks having received a warning of a negative Wall Street Journal investigation and murder as some patients who were part of his cancer drug study died suddenly of possible allergic reactions as a consequence of a cover up.  Reluctantly and feeling  in frail health himself after having survived several forms of cancer he agrees to defend his old friend promising Marta this will be his last case.

What follows is a tour de force in search of the truth through every step of the trial which is so brilliantly argued and composed you feel like you are a real life spectator in the court room unsure which trap door or argument will open next. It is not only one of the best legal thrillers I have ever read but the strength of this novel lies in its detailed portrayal of all the characters emotions and motives providing deep and philosophical insights into the dark and fragile side of human nature, the might friendships and family hold over all of our lives. I have no idea how brilliantly Scott Turow's legal mind must be working to arrive at such a complex storyline. 

This masterful book held my absolute attention for all its 465 pages; and I do love the last sentence, 5 stars from me!  

Imogen Kealey: Liberation, Sphere / Little Brown UK, 9780751576023, C format paperback, available

German Edition: Die Spionin, Rütten & Loening, großformatiges Paperback

Imogen Robertson is a writer of historical fiction and Darby Kealey a writer and producer based in Hollywood; together they form the writing duo Imogen Kealey.

“Liberation” is a true page-turner of a novel very closely based on the real life of one of the most fearless female resistance fighters, Nancy Wake, to be turned into a movie by Anne Hathaway.  Nancy Wake went by many codenames; one “Helene” or “Madame Andree” but the Nazis occupying France hunted her by the name „The White Mouse” with a five million Franc bounty on her head.  Nancy was originally Australian when working as a journalist in Paris in 1936 until she met the love of her life, her husband Henri Fiocca who had  a sizeable fortune living in Marseille.  Soon Nancy joins the résistance using the cover of a wealthy wife of one of Marseilles prominent citizens  becoming one of their most fearless fighters after the Gestapo incarcerate her seemingly untouchable husband. 

It would be cruel of me to unveil more of Nancy’s breathtaking, extraordinary life and fighting from 1936 until the end of the war captured in this fast paced novel. Several books have been written about the legend Nancy Wake, all approaching her life story from a different angle but the Hollywood handwriting with all its drama building lies at the core of this thriller which makes for perfect summer reading set against a very dark historical background.  It certainly kept me breathless, shocked and in disbelief several times.