“Always.”
“With this one, I mean. Lots of people want to talk to him. So all the old rules. He doesn’t go out. He doesn’t—”
“I know the rules, Tommy. If you’re that nervous, why don’t you pick him up yourself?”
“Spread the bets, Leon. This time, I’m not even at the table. Nothing to see, nothing to connect me. I just pack up my bags and leave. You run into people on the plane, that’s all. But I can’t put him there. The board would light up. I’m not invisible here.”
“And I am.”
“You’re freelance. They won’t be expecting that. Not for him.”
“What’s he got, that you have to take him to Washington yourself?”
“Leon.”
“You owe me that much.”
Tommy looked at him for a minute, then downed the rest of his drink. “Lots,” he said finally, nodding. “Up here.” He touched his temple. “Also a very nice photo album.”
“Of?”
“Mother Russia. Aerial recon. The Germans photographed everything, when they still could. Valuable snaps now.”
“And he got these how?”
“That I couldn’t say. Fell off a truck, maybe. Things do. Want another?”
Leon shook his head. “I’d better go. Start being invisible. Here, finish this.”
“Well, since I’m paying—”
Leon stood up. “Some evening.”
“Tomorrow then. One more and you’re a free man.”
Leon looked at him, disconcerted by the phrase. “Who is he, Tommy?”
“He’ll answer to John.”
“As in Johann? German?”
“As in John Doe.” He glanced up. “No funny business, okay? Let Washington ask the questions. Just do your piece. There’ll be a bonus in it, if I can talk them into it.”
“I don’t care about that.”
“That’s right. Good of the country. Still. Think of it as— I don’t know, for old times’ sake.” He turned his head to the room.
“You coming?”
“I’ll just finish this. Give the place one last look. Goddam three-ring circus, wasn’t it?” he said, his voice drooping, like his eyes, maudlin.
Leon picked up his damp coat. “By the way,” Tommy said, sharp again. “Separate pieces, but where the hell’s Laleli?”
“Past the university. Before you get to Aksaray.”
“Christ, who goes out there?”
“That’s the idea.”
PRAISE FOR STARDUST
“In Stardust, Kanon rescues postwar Los Angeles from noir clichés. . . .Hovering over it all, like a freakish fog off the Pacific, is the shadow of the Holocaust, its enormity only now becoming apparent. . . . [Kanon] operates with an intelligence that briskly evokes the atmosphere of a vanished era.” —The New York Times Book Review
“A delicious synthesis of menace and glamour, historical fact and rich imagination. . . . Among the real movie people making appearances here is Paulette Goddard—just one element of a perfect setting for a story in which nothing is obvious.” —The Seattle Times
“Spectacular in every way . . . wonderfully imagined, wonderfully written, an urgent personal mystery set against the sweep of glamorous and sinister history. Joseph Kanon owns this corner of the literary landscape and it's a joy to see him reassert his title with such emphatic authority.” —Lee Child
“Stardust is sensational! No one writes period fiction with the same style and suspense – not to mention substance—as Joseph Kanon. A terrific read.” —Scott Turow
“STARDUST is the perfect combination of intrigue and accurate history brought to life.” —Alan Furst
PRAISE FOR PREVIOUS NOVELS BY JOSEPH KANON
The Good German
“Kanon is the heir apparent to Graham Greene; he writes of moral quandaries that are real and not created to drive a plot. A multilayered story, beautifully told.” —The Boston Globe
“[Kanon] is fast approaching the complexity and relevance not just of le Carré and Green but even of Orwell: provocative, fully realizes fiction that explores, as only fiction can, the reality of history as it is lived by individual men and women.” —The New York Times Book Review
“As he did in Los Alamos, Kanon demonstrates an eerie mastery of the evocative historical detail . . . You can feel the shattered glass crunching beneath your feet as you read. You can smell the smoke-scorched broken bricks . . . Kanon is as ambitious a novelist as he is a gifted one.” —The Washington Post
“Gripping . . . Kanon has written a tale about the untenable choices war entails, and about the moral dangers of demonization. For American readers, the book cuts to the bone, coming at a time when we have become the demonized and are doing our best to avoid becoming the demonizers.” —Newsday
“The kind of book that reads so easily that it’s almost impossible to put down once you’ve started it.” —The Baltimore Sun
“What the The Third Man World did for Vienna immediately after World War II, Kanon’s superb thriller does for Berlin during the same period.” —Booklist
Alibi
“Burrowing deeply into Patricia Highsmith territory, Kanon has crafted an absorbing tale . . . [Kanon is frequently compared to the likes of john le Carré and Graham Greene. With Alibi, he shows that he’s up to the comparison.” —San Francisco Chronicle
“Kanon’s richest, most full-blooded work to date . . . [He] has mastered the art of the historical thriller.” —The New York Times Book Review
“Disturbing and hypnotically readable, Alibi is a mystery, a love story, and a work of philosophy—and a perfect companion for the thriller reader who wants a philosophical challenge, as well as entertainment.” —Richmond Times-Dispatch
“Joseph Kanon is a specialist in superior historical thrillers. . . . Moody, deeply atmospheric, and as labyrinthine as the streets of Venice.” —The Seattle Times
“Alibi is a thriller with a slide-rule perfect plot . . . Wholly engrossing and one of the finest thrillers you will read this year – up there with the classics of the genre.”—The Daily Telegraph (London)
“Once again, Kanon has written a novel set against the backdrops of World War II that is evocative and sensitive, moody and thought provoking.” —Arizona Daily Star
“Kanon juxtaposes a powerful love story and a gripping thriller against a palpable historical moment. . . . The novel holds us completely, with its vision of a sadly inadequate hero striking deep at our fears about ourselves.”—Booklist
“Kanon offers such vivid sensory detail that a reader emerges as steeped in atmospherics as a seasoned diplomat with a passport full of visa stamps. You feel initiated, as if you’ve been let in on some dark and well-kept secrets from some of the twentieth century’s most pivotal moments. . . . In Kanon’s eclectic cast of policemen, soldiers, revolutionaries, and ex-pat socialites, no one is spared the deep, dark smudges offered by war and its aftermath.” —Baltimore Sun
“If you want to explore life, love, death, beauty, and moral confusion, you won’t do much better than this.” —San Jose Mercury News
The Prodigal Spy
“An edgy spy thriller . . . [and] a tale of love—between father and son, man and woman—set against a foreboding background that is poignant and imminently believable.” —The Denver Post
“Compelling . . . intriguing . . . reads beautifully and convinces utterly.” —The Wall Street Journal
Los Alamos
“Powerful . . . Compelling . . . [Kanon] pulls the reader into a historical drama of excitement and high moral seriousness.” —The New York Times
“A well-plotted novel that effortlessly dissolves real people and events into an elegant and moving thriller.” —San Francisco Chronicle
About the Author
Joseph Kanon is the author of five previous novels Stardust, Alibi, The Good German, The Prodigal Spy, and Los Alamos. Alibi won the 2005 Hammett Award for Best Novel from the International Association of Crime Writers, a
nd Kanon was the 2007 recipient of The Anne Frank Foundation Writes Award. His work has appeared in 24 languages. Before becoming a full-time writer, he was a book publishing executive. He lives in New York City.
Atria Books/Simon & Schuster Author Page
authors.simonandschuster.com/Joseph-Kanon/1766010
Author Website
JosephKanon.com
A Walking Tour of Hollywood
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