The Spy Across the Water by James Naughtie

Also on the #blogtour for #TheSpyAcrosstheWater today is MJ Porter

From one of our most treasured BBC broadcasters, The Spy Across the Water is the third instalment in James Naughtie’s brilliant spy series, woven around three brothers bound together through espionage.

We live with our history, but it can kill us.

Faces from the past appear from nowhere at a family funeral, and Will Flemyng, spy-turned-ambassador, is drawn into twin mysteries that threaten everything he holds dear.

From Washington, he’s pitched back into the Troubles in Northern Ireland and an explosive secret hidden deep in the most dangerous but fulfilling friendship he has known.

And while he confronts shadowy adversaries in American streets, and looks for solace at home in the Scottish Highlands, he discovers that his government’s most precious Cold War agent is in mortal danger and needs his help to survive.

In an electric story of courage and betrayal, Flemyng learns the truth that his life has left him a man with many friends, but still alone.

Is James Naughtie the most under the radar national treasure ever? If, like me, you grew up with his honeyed tones on Radio 4’s Today programme – and miss them still – then perhaps you might think he is. Reading The Spy Across the Water, made me feel really quite nostalgic for this man who’s voice is like a warm bath for the brain.

And Naughtie’s prose flows as seemingly effortlessly as his voice. Our central protagonist, Will Flemyng, is at the opening of the novel, US Ambassador under Thatcher’s government. One of the strongest aspects of the text is the way Naughtie does not fetishize those period details. Increasingly, one finds authors determined to insert their extensive research of their chosen historical milleau into their readers as though we were feeding to become fois gras and them the farmers. Naughtie does little to none of this.

Flemyng: good genre adjacent name; unobtrusively achieved by selection of spelling – and here, let us take a moment to appreciate what that particular spelling must have meant for poor JN’s typing and autocorrect functions on his word processor – is an attractive and debonair hero. A man of slick and accessible charm who can be a little prickly but always working towards the best available outcome.

This inner calm of the character clashing with the storm cloud building of the external events galloping towards him is mirrored by Washington setting intruding on the “Highland” rural idyll of the Flemyng family seat in Perthshire.

All in all, this is a fine spy thriller. It is smooth and slick without being showy or flashy. The cover wins points for me by not leaning on the “silhouette man” cliché which bestrides this genre like a colossus, but loses them again for the seeming cheapness of the design.

Overall, a literary thriller which wears its learning lightly and makes spending time with the hero a delight. Rather like discovering your childhood heroes are still thriving and working on their national treasure status.

Purchase Link – https://geni.us/TSATWRRR

Author Bio –

James Naughtie is a special correspondent for BBC News, for which he has reported from around the world. He presented Today on BBC Radio 4 for 21 years. This his third novel, and his most recent book is an account of five decades of travel and work in the United States – On the Road: American Adventures from Nixon to Trump. He lives in Edinburgh and London.

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