{"id":11101,"date":"2024-08-12T07:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-08-12T11:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=11101"},"modified":"2024-08-11T18:41:37","modified_gmt":"2024-08-11T22:41:37","slug":"the-translator","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=11101","title":{"rendered":"The Translator"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Harriet Crawley\u2019s The Translator<\/a><\/em>\u2014lauded by UK media as one of the best thrillers of 2023\u2014is finally available in the United States. In it, a British translator is called away from his vacation in the Scottish Highlands to accompany the Prime Minister on a lightning trip to Moscow. Clive Franklin is one of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office\u2019s best Russian-English-Russian translators, and before he can say Kinlochleven, he\u2019s snatched out of his vacation and loaded onto a helicopter. The Prime Minister\u2019s staff has taken care of providing everything\u2014documents, clothing, new business cards, and medications\u2014he\u2019ll need.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While staff members tried to prepare for any contingency, they didn\u2019t anticipate that his opposite number in Moscow, Marina Volina, an equally expert translator for Russian President Nikolai Serov, is someone Clive fell in love with when they both worked at the United Nations. Marina broke it off, married, became a widow, and is now one of Serov\u2019s most trusted aides. When Clive sees her again, he\u2019s smitten anew, and Crawley convincingly portrays the emotion they feel for each other and how hard they must work to hide it in a land of paranoia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If Marina looks older, tired, it is mostly because a young man she considered her son, Pasha, has died, reportedly of a drug overdose. The morning of the UK-Russia meeting, she receives this note from Vanya, Pasha\u2019s brother: \u201cPasha was murdered. By your lot.\u201d That is, the FSB (successor to the KGB). It\u2019s unthinkable, but Marina is convinced it\u2019s true.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The UK-Russian discussions do not go well. Underneath all the diplomatic blustering, the Russians are evidently up to something. In her grief and anger, Marina determines to find out what it is, tell Clive, avert some unknown catastrophe, and somehow get herself and Vanya out of the country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Her chief antagonist is Pasha\u2019s former boss, General Varlamov, deputy director of the FSB, who believes himself in line for the top position. Protecting Russia\u2019s secrets and punishing those who violate them would be his crowning achievement. Varlamov\u2019s spies, cameras, and microphones are everywhere. Resentful of Marina\u2019s close relationship with President Serov, Varlamov makes sure her every move is watched.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At their first Moscow diplomatic meeting together, small talk reveals both Marina and Clive are marathon runners. Training for the forthcoming Moscow marathon helps Marina keep her wits about her. Serov encourages Clive to enter also, thinking he\u2019ll get a photograph of the Englishman on his knees\u2014some propaganda victory, there. At first Clive demurs, as he hasn\u2019t planned to stay in Moscow for long, but it turns out that practice runs let him and Marina exchange information, as their minders can\u2019t keep up. Hoping he\u2019ll pry some information from her, the Brits ask him to stay. Clive and Marina must carve a path through a cast of interesting and believable characters\u2014spies, diplomats, apparatchiks, and brave anti-regime protestors, friends and enemies alike.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Crawley creates a strong sense of the oppressive atmosphere\u2014constantly watched, every conversation listened to. Marina is playing a dangerous chess game, calculating every move based not only on what she hopes to accomplish, but how it will appear to Varlamov.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The story contains several ticking clocks that raise the tension to keep-you-up-reading levels. There\u2019s whatever the Russians are planning, the timeline of which is uncertain because Serov is dithering. The British want to deploy countermeasures, but need more information to do it in time. There\u2019s the marathon, which is on a date certain. There is Varlamov\u2019s persistent circling closer to the truth about Marina. And, there is the unfolding of the cleverly planned and innocent-seeming actions Marina sets in motion, in order to secure her and Vanya\u2019s escape. Crawley\u2019s expert plotting brings all these streams together in an entirely satisfying way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I love a good spy story, and The Translator<\/a><\/em> is terrific!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Harriet Crawley\u2019s The Translator\u2014lauded by UK media as one of the best thrillers of 2023\u2014is finally available in the United States. In it, a British translator is called away from his vacation in the Scottish Highlands to accompany the Prime … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"The Cold War never ended, it was just sleeping for a while. Harriet Crawley's Exciting new thriller show the nap is over. Her characters are ones you'll love to cheer all the way to the finish line.","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[193,126,66],"tags":[2208,1181],"class_list":["post-11101","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-espionage","category-reading-2","category-suspense","tag-britain","tag-russia"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2NkiT-2T3","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11101","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11101"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11101\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11103,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11101\/revisions\/11103"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11101"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11101"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11101"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}