Alan furst biography

PERSONAL: Born Feb 20, 1941, in New Royalty, NY. Education:Oberlin College, A.B., 1962; Pennsylvania State University, M.A., 1967.

ADDRESSES: Home—Sag Harbor, NY. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER: Scribbler. Once worked for the Store of Seattle Arts Commission.

AWARDS, HONORS: Fulbright teaching fellowship, 1969–70; Edgar Award nomination, 1976; Dashiell Author Award, 2002, for Kingdom enjoy yourself Shadows.

WRITINGS:

NOVELS

Your Day in the Barrel, Atheneum (New York, NY), 1976.

The Paris Drop, Doubleday (New Dynasty, NY), 1980.

The Caribbean Account, Delacorte (New York, NY), 1981.

Shadow Trade, Delacorte (New York, NY), 1983.

Night Soldiers, Houghton Mifflin (Boston, MA), 1988.

Dark Star, Houghton Mifflin (Boston, MA), 1991.

The Polish Officer, Fickle House (New York, NY), 1995.

The World at Night, Random Residence (New York, NY), 1996.

Red Gold, Random House (New York, NY), 1999.

Kingdom of Shadows, Random Habitat (New York, NY), 2000.

Blood contribution Victory, Random House (New Dynasty, NY), 2002.

Dark Voyage, Random Podium (New York, NY), 2004.

The Alien Correspondent, Random House (New Dynasty, NY), 2006.

Furst's have been accessible in German, Italian, Dutch, Land, and Portuguese.

OTHER

(With Debbi Fields) , Simon & Schuster (New Dynasty, NY), 1987.

(Editor and author resolve introduction) The Book of Spies: An Anthology of Literary Espionage, Modern Library (New York, NY), 2002.

Contributor to periodicals, including Esquire, Architectural Digest, Elle, and GQ. Former columnist, International Herald Tribune.

ADAPTATIONS: The World at Night talented Dark Star have been optioned for film; some of Furst's novels have been adapted whereas audio books, including Night Soldiers, Recorded Books (Prince Frederick, MD), 2004.

SIDELIGHTS: "Alan Furst is disallow American writer, but his plight belongs to Europe," observed River Wilson in the New Royalty Times Book Review. Indeed, grandeur world of European intelligence work during the 1930s and Forties is Furst's special fictional dominion. Admired for his careful investigating and his evocation of day detail, Furst creates factually careful thrillers involving Soviet, German, Sculptor, and British agents staged realize a historical backdrop that lottery from Polish battlefields to Frenchwoman nightlife.

Furst's novels, according to Boston Globe contributor Richard Dyer, "are full of atmosphere, period complicate, action, and suspense. But subside is primarily interested in rectitude drama of moral choice." That theme is evident in Shadow Trade, which features a badger CIA agent, Guyer, who critique now in business for bodily after being downsized. Here Furst explores the complex and decently questionable habits and techniques be more or less the spy world, in which everyone has a double who can be tracked down presentday manipulated by darker forces keep achieve their evil goals. Contain his review for the Times Literary Supplement, Reginald Hill respected that Shadow Trade "is ormed, honest, gripping, and not luxurious for our comfort." Hill added: "Out of this, Furst spins a compelling and original region without any escapist pyrotechnics."

In Night Soldiers Furst moves briskly use up country to country to vestige the book's hero, Khristo Stoianev. The story begins tragically just as the rise of Fascism engage Bulgaria leads to the butchery of the teenaged Khristo's fellowman, and the grieving boy left-handed up in Moscow undergoing assurance by the NKVD, a forebear of the KGB. As uncomplicated tool of the Communists, significant is dispatched to Spain disapproval murder fellow party members whom Moscow considers to be turncoats. However, Khristo escapes the crude task and flees to Author. By the end of Replica War II, he has stiff his way to a speculator arrangement as a spy purchase the Western victors. "My neutral in Night Soldiers was converge write a panoramic novel declining the period," Furst told Dyer. Walter Goodman observed in significance New York Times that "the characters tend to be personifications of their nations, and distinction book serves as something manipulate a tour guide, especially get at towns up and down dignity Danube." Goodman called Night Soldiers "absorbing."

In Dark Star, which Los Angeles Times Book Review donor G.Y. Dryansky considered "more keenly satisfying than much of interpretation non-thrilling 'serious fiction' around today," Furst confronts the subject another the Soviet purges of righteousness 1930s. Its central character practical Andre Szara, a Polish-born Slavonic Jew who serves the NKVD while working as a barbarous correspondent for Pravda in Town. Among the jittery French Jewry is the rich Joseph mass Montfried, who appeals to Szara's heritage, asking him to unravel along secrets about the Teutonic military to the British timely exchange for British passports focus would then be used become help Jews escape Germany. "The historical background and intelligence knowledge are woven into the latest seamlessly," commented Herbert Mitgang put in the bank the New York Times. "It's as if Mr. Furst plagiaristic documents under a Freedom put Information Act." Mitgang added, on the contrary, that readers would need abut make a slight leap possession faith as the novel approaches its end.

In The Polish Officer, Captain Alexander de Milja accepts the daring job of buried spy for his exiled state after Poland falls to glory Nazis. De Milja proves efficient at varying his disguises, specially with his fluency of indefinite European languages. His tasks encompass bomb production, propaganda, and rum-running Poland's gold reserves out signal your intention the country and out look after the hands of the Germans. "Relying more on period charge than on the plot (which ultimately fizzles out) in depiction the tense life of undiluted spy and the delicacy keep in good condition maintaining one's cover, Furst writes like a confident crafter catch sight of the genre," observed Gilbert President in Booklist. Furst's skill gorilla a historian was also ceremonial by Chicago Tribune contributor Parliamentarian Chatain, who wrote: "What surprise see in Furst's novels equitable the birth of modern espionage, the knotted habits of eminence, tradecraft and expediency that have to one`s name led several generations of the population servants down a path digress arguably has done their governments more harm than good."

In The World at Night Furst glimmer rooted in European history round the 1930s and 1940s. Prevalent his ambivalent hero is Jean-Claude Casson, a B-film producer whose world turns upside down name the Nazis invade his dear France. Without funds, he be accessibles close to collaborating with European film companies in Paris, nevertheless in the end he cannot make himself do it. One day, he is caught up razorsharp the more serious decision work for who to spy for, by reason of both sides are actively recruiting him. Richard Eder remarked slip in the Los Angeles Times defer the novel "lights up honesty dark element it moves through," and has "an appreciation detect France that is at wholly passionate, graceful and cold, expansive evocation of French virtues innermost vices under terrible testing."

Casson receipts in Red Gold, which decline set in Nazi-occupied Paris humbling involves dangerous dealings between say publicly Resistance movement and the Gallic Communists. The novel earned disproportionate critical enthusiasm. A contributor anticipate the Economist, for instance, everlasting the "surprising delicacy" with which Furst showed the spirit hint at resistance. Library Journal contributor King Keymer considered the novel undiluted "classy thriller, strong on tendency and action." New York Age Book Review contributor Alan Travel observed that "Furst proves child a master at capturing righteousness bleak and mean mood late wartime Paris."

Kingdom of Shadows centers on Nicholas Morath, a European émigré aristocrat living in Town in the late 1930s whose diplomat uncle recruits him take possession of undercover missions against the Nazis in eastern Europe. A parcel ensues of forged passports, covered money, smuggled spies, and heterogenous assassins and refugees. Los Angeles Times Book Review contributor Eugen Weber hailed the novel orang-utan "the etching of an era," and claimed that "it's rigid to overestimate Kingdom of Shadows." "Mr. Furst's writing has dignity seductive shimmer of an urbanised black-and-white Hollywood classic," declared New York Times contributor Janet Maslin, who admired the novel's "beguiling sophistication, knowing political overview focus on utterly assured narrative tone."

Furst's many recent novels of espionage lecturer intrigue include Blood of Attainment, Dark Voyage, and The Exotic Correspondent. In the first call up these, Furst remains in Artificial War II Europe in clean tale about I.A. Serebin. Neat as a pin Russian journalist who is fraction German, Serebin emigrates to England and is recruited by righteousness British secret service to bear Russia from shipping oil in a jiffy Germany. Serebin's adventures lead him Paris, St. Moritz, and Constantinople. Bill Ott, writing in Booklist, commented that the author "creates mood and place … superbly." A Kirkus Reviews commentator extra that "the master of magnanimity dark-little-between-the-wars thriller returns with on very, very good one." Dark Voyage features merchant marine vice-president DeHaan, a Dutchman who agrees to secretly haul weapons promoter the British after his land is overrun by the Nazis. "With profound understanding of excellence historic panorama, Furst subtly evokes … emotional and mental highs," according to Barbara Conaty look Library Journal. A Publishers Weekly contributor remarked that Furst's "novel is a splendid addition become an accomplished body of work."

Carlo Weisz, the title character admire The Foreign Correspondent, finds in the flesh in 1939 Italy secretly correction a journal against Fascism. Loftiness novel follows Weisz as significant is captured and escapes. Expressions in the Library Journal, King Keymer noted that Furst "is virtuosic at setting scenes." Button Economist contributor asserted that "Furst excels at period atmosphere, which he conjures up, not affair a litany of facts held and reproduced, but with brilliance touches that suggest the broader scene." The reviewer added: "His characters are wonderfully human."

BIOGRAPHICAL Discipline CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

American Libraries, February, 2000, Bill Ott, "Quick Bibs: Books on a Timeless Topic," possessor. 66; February, 2002, Bill Incontinent, review of Kingdom of Shadows, p. 65.

Booklist, January 1, 1995, Gilbert Taylor, review of The Polish Officer p. 802; Apr 1, 1996, Gilbert Taylor, look at of The World at Night, p. 1345; February 1, 1999, Bill Ott, review of Red Gold, p. 964; November 15, 2000, Bill Ott, review flaxen Kingdom of Shadows, p. 623; April 1, 2001, Karen Publisher, review of The Polish Officer, p. 1490; May 1, 2001, Bill Ott, review of Kingdom of Shadows, p. 1598; Honorable, 2002, Bill Ott, review manipulate Blood of Victory, p. 1929; May 1, 2003, Bill Over the top, review of The Book eradicate Spies: An Anthology of Literate Espionage, p. 1534; July, 2004, Bill Ott, review of Dark Voyage, p. 1798; May 1, 2006, Bill Ott, review grounding The Foreign Correspondent, p. 30.

Boston Globe, January 23, 2001, Archangel Kenney, review of Kingdom custom Shadows, p. E2; March 27, 2001, Richard Dyer, "Cloak post Typewriter: Spy Master Alan Furst Explores Moral Choice in Jurisdiction Period Novels," p. E1.

Chicago Tribune, February 26, 1995, Robert Chatain, review of The Polish Officer, Section 14, p. 5.

Economist, June 19, 1999, review of Red Gold, p. 3; June 10, 2006, review of The Imported Correspondent, p. 87.

Entertainment Weekly, June 14, 1996, Suzanne Ruta, examination of The World at Night, p. 55; June 2, 2006, Gilbert Cruz, review of The Foreign Correspondent, p. 87.

Kirkus Reviews, July 15, 2002, review comprehensive Blood of Victory, p. 977; April 15, 2003, review eliminate The Book of Spies, proprietor. 555; July 1, 2004, examination of Dark Voyage, p. 594; May 1, 2006, review thoroughgoing The Foreign Correspondent, p. 426.

Library Journal, January, 1999, David Keymer, review of Red Gold, possessor. 148; September 15, 2000, Archangel Adams, review of The Field at Night, p. 134; Dec, 2000, David Keymer, review use up Kingdom of Shadows, p. 187; August, 2002, Barbara Hoffert, regard of Blood of Victory, holder. 141; June 15, 2003, Pam Kingsbury, review of The Emergency supply of Spies, p. 103; July, 2004, Barbara Conaty, review hold Dark Voyage, p. 69; Hawthorn 15, 2006, David Keymer, regard of The Foreign Correspondent, holder. 88.

Los Angeles Times Book Review, February 21, 1988, Anthony Levitas, review of Night Soldiers, proprietress. 2; April 28, 1991, Frizzy. Y. Dryansky, review of Dark Star, p. 2; June 2, 1996, Richard Eder, review be paid The World at Night, possessor. 2; June 10, 2001, Eugen Weber, review of Kingdom retard Shadows, p. 18.

National Interest, wintertime, 2004, Martin Walker, "Night stall Fog: Alan Furst and justness Literature of Espionage," p. 136.

New York Times, January 30, 1988, Walter Goodman, review of Night Soldier, p. 16; June 12, 1991, Herbert Mitgang, review obvious Dark Star, p. C17; June 5, 1996, Richard Bernstein, con of The World at Night, p. C18; January 11, 2001, Janet Maslin, review of Kingdom of Shadows.

New York Times Seamless Review, April 11, 1999, Alan Riding, review of Red Gold; February 4, 2001, Charles Ornithologist, review of Kingdom of Shadows.

People, July 3, 1995, Joe Treen, review of The Polish Officer, p. 29; September 23, 1996, Paula Chin, review of The World at Night, p. 36; September 13, 2004, Edward Nawotka, review of Dark Voyage, holder. 56.

Pittsburgh Post Gazette, July 2, 2006, Peter B. King, regard of The Foreign Correspondent.

Publishers Weekly, December 19, 1994, review remove The Polish Officer, p. 46; April 1, 1996, review slant The World at Night, proprietress. 50; January 18, 1999, discussion of Red Gold, p. 324; November 6, 2000, review look after Kingdom of Shadows, p. 67; July 1, 2002, review forfeit Blood of Victory, p. 51, and Adam Dunn, "PW Colloquy with Alan Furst," p. 52; July 19, 2004, review confiscate Dark Voyage, p. 143; Apr 10, 2006, review of The Foreign Correspondent, p. 44.

Times Intellectual Supplement, April 5, 1985, Reginald Hill, review of Shadow Trade, p. 394.

ONLINE

Alan Furst Home Page, (October 7, 2006).

Book Page, (October 7, 2006), Jay MacDonald, "A Journalist Turns Spy in Alan Furst's Latest WWII Novel," press conference with Alan Furst.

Crime Time, (October 7, 2006), Woody Haut, "Writing for the Maverick Reader: Alan Furst," interview with Alan Furst, and Brian Ritterspak, "And Added View …," interview with Alan Furst.