This American author, residing in France, specializes in spy novels that frequently delve into the worlds of the CIA and the Soviet Union. His background as a journalist for Newsweek during the Cold War provided him with a keen understanding of the geopolitical tensions and covert operations that inform his compelling narratives. His writing style is characterized by suspenseful pacing and intricate plotting, drawing readers into complex moral landscapes. An avid mountain climber, his experiences may lend a unique perspective to the high-stakes challenges faced by his characters.
Set against the backdrop of New York City in early 1917, the narrative follows Lev Davidovich Bronshtein, known as Leon Trotsky, as he navigates life as a fugitive and revolutionary. With his family by his side, he grapples with profound questions about his ideology, familial bonds, and his connection to Lenin. As the February Revolution looms, Trotsky's journey becomes a compelling exploration of purpose, passion, and the sacrifices required for progress, masterfully crafted by espionage fiction author Robert Littell.
Set against a backdrop of espionage and American history, this spy thriller delves into a top-secret CIA plan that has unexpectedly leaked. The narrative follows an operative known as "the Weeder," whose obsession with historical figures intertwines with a deadly race to uncover the leak. As the story unfolds, it explores complex moral dilemmas and the clash between past and present, raising questions about truth and patriotism. Robert Littell's masterful storytelling reveals the dark underbelly of intelligence operations, solidifying his reputation in the genre.
Set against the backdrop of the Cold War, a disillusioned American scientist, A.J. Lewinter, makes a bold move to defect to the Soviet Union, igniting a high-stakes game of espionage. As he navigates the treacherous waters between the KGB and CIA, his potential insights could shift the balance of power amidst growing public dissent in the U.S. and resource scarcity in the Soviet Union. This darkly humorous spy thriller showcases Robert Littell's sharp commentary on international politics and the complexities of loyalty and truth.
Racing across a landscape spanning the legendary Berlin Base of the '50s, the Soviet invasion of Hungary, the Bay of Pigs, Afghanistan, and the Gorbachev putsch, The Company tells the thrilling story of agents imprisoned in double lives, fighting an amoral, elusive, formidable enemy -- and each other -- in an internecine battle within the Company itself.
A tight, captivating story of a naive child’s encounters with a Soviet dictator, the 20th novel by Robert Littell Leon Rozental—ten and a half, intellectually precocious, and possessing a disarming candor—is suddenly alone after the death of his nuclear physicist father and the arrest of his mother during the Stalinist purge of Jewish doctors. Now on his own and hiding from the NKVD in the secret rooms of the House on the Embankment, the massive building in Moscow where many Soviet officials and apparatchiks live and work, Leon starts to explore. One day, after following a passageway, Leon meets Koba, an old man whose apartment is protected by several guards. Koba is a high-ranking Soviet official with troubling insight into the thoughts and machinations of Comrade Stalin. In this taut and layered novel, New York Times bestselling author Robert Littell deploys his deep knowledge of this complex period in Russian history and masterful talent for captivating storytelling to create a nuanced portrayal of the Soviet dictator, showing Stalin’s human side and his simultaneous total disregard for and ignorance of the suffering he inflicted on the Russian people. The charm and spontaneity of young Leon make him an irresistible narrator—and not unlike Holden Caulfield, whom he admits to identifying with—caught in the spider’s web of the story woven by this enigmatic old man.
Moscow, March 1953: As Stalin breathes his last, four women meet in Room 408 of the luxurious hotel Metropol. They have gathred to reminisce about the great poet Vladimir Mayakovsky, whose work they once inspired. Following his mysterious suicide twenty-five years earlier, he was canonised by Stalin - but in life he was a farmore complicated man, violently torn between art and politics. As his muses piece together their conflicting memories of the man, a portrait of the artist as a tormented young idealist emerges, revealing him as a sexual obsessive caught in the eye of history's storm, struggling to hold on to his ideals in the face of a revolution betrayed. In Vladimir M., Robert Littell creates a provocative cocktail of fiction and reality, bringing to life the tumultuous Stalinist era and the disaster it spelt for the artists it ensnared.
Set in March 1953, the story unfolds in Room 408 of Moscow's Hotel Metropol, where four women come together to reflect on the complex legacy of Vladimir Mayakovsky. While he is revered as a national idol after his death, their discussions reveal the intricacies of his life and the multifaceted nature of his character, providing insights into both the poet and the cultural atmosphere of Soviet Russia.
Former homicide detective and CIA agent Lemuel Gunn left behind the Afghanistan battlefield for a trailer in New Mexico to forge a new career as a private investigator. Out of nowhere comes Ornella Neppi, a woman making a mess of her uncle's bail bonds business. She asks Gunn to track down the source of her troubles, a man named Emilio Gava, who has jumped bail after being arrested for buying cocaine. But no photos of Gava seem to exist. As Gunn begins his search for a man it seems that someone is protecting, hitting dead end after dead end, he starts to suspect that Gava might not exist at all...
One midnight in January in the early 1960s, the Russian freighter Domatova quietly slipped out of Beirut harbour. The ship had sailed with a single passenger on board: an Englishman named Harold Adrian Russell Philby, nicknamed Kim. He had fled the Lebanese capital with little more than the clothes on his back. Would Moscow Centre welcome him as a senior Soviet intelligence officer?
