Reviewed by Fiona Ingram for Readers' Favorite

Gerard Le Caillec is the counterfeit consul, just one of many disguises he has held in his career in the French Foreign Intelligence Service. Quiet, unassuming and (to his superiors) utterly expendable, Gerard struggles for promotion. He is handed an excellent opportunity to make or break his career when he is posted to the New York City office of the service. It involves the destruction of armament warehouses on a Hoboken, New Jersey pier. The plot is set in 1916, against a backdrop of a world at war in Europe, and a neutral America supplying arms and munitions to both sides. The French hope that by bombing the warehouses, the American public will become aware of America’s duplicity and protest against this hypocritical stance. Either way, the French hope to force America either to join the battle on the side of the allies or cease supplying the Germans. Gerard is brilliant at one particular aspect of his job: recruiting agents. His unassuming personality enables him to tap into the weaknesses and foibles of his targets and lure them into his mode of operations. On the orders of his superiors in Paris, he focuses on Armand Barsoum, a weak, spendthrift playboy, the scion of a prestigious French banking firm, working in their New York division. Armand tends to go for fast women and slow horses, a deadly combination that soon has him bankrupt and susceptible to Gerard’s offer of money. However, Gerard wonders if Armand is indeed the right person to set the dynamite and bomb the warehouses. Armand tries to wriggle out of their agreement and blurts his involvement to Trudy Gehr, a coarse German-born woman living in Hoboken. She, in turn, informs a friend who informs . . . and when the Military Attaché at the Imperial German Consulate in New York learns of the plot, he makes immediate plans to deal with it.

This is an original spy novel with much to enjoy. The author’s style suits the era and the subject matter. The intricacies of the plot unfold carefully, almost too slowly in the beginning as the author sets the scene for what is potentially an international firestorm. I enjoyed the meticulous details bringing the various characters to life. The author also paints an incredibly detailed picture of the New York of the early twentieth century: loud, tawdry, corrupt and filled with clubs, drinkers, bookies, gamblers, and goodtime gals. In this, the author succeeds admirably in taking the reader back to another era. Although some editing could speed up the pace of the action, the unfolding of events brings its own suspense-filled timing. With an interesting final twist to the tale, this is a great read for readers who enjoy historical and spy thrillers.