The Trinity Six
Review: What if the Cambridge Five -- a group of young men attending Trinity College at Cambridge University during the 1930s, who were recruited to pass state secrets to the Soviet Union, and identified as spies decades later -- had a sixth member, one unknown even to this day? This premise forms the foundation for The Trinity Six, a political thriller by Charles Cumming.
A Slavonic and East European Studies professor at the University College of London, Sam Gaddis is in financial straits. A well respected historian, with several books to his credit, he needs an advance on his next book to get him current on his accounts. An idea for a book comes from two separate directions: Holly Levette, a student in one of his classes, offers to let him see some documents that her late mother had obtained while working on the history of the KGB; and Charlotte Berg, a journalist friend, tells him she's been contacted by someone who claims to know of the existence of a sixth Cambridge spy. Over dinner, Charlotte offers the name of Thomas Neame as her contact, and Edward Crane as the spy, but that night she suffers a fatal heart attack. Sam takes possession of what few notes she had made, and tracks down Neame, who tells him about his time at Cambridge with Crane. Suspicious that Neame isn't giving him the whole story, he contacts other people who may have known Crane -- a man who supposedly died in 1992 -- that catch the attention of both current Russian and British intelligence.
The Cambridge Five -- a real group of spies -- has been the inspiration for many novels, but what makes The Trinity Six different, and in no small part makes it so appealing, is the unexpected path the story takes. There's not much that isn't known to the reader, so one is lulled into a sense of false expectation of what is to come, only to be surprised when something unforeseen happens. The cat-and-mouse aspect is well crafted, but with three parties involved: Sam Gaddis, the British Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), and the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), each in one way or another playing the other two against each other. Though somewhat convoluted in places -- the large number of primary and supporting characters can be a little hard to keep track of -- this is overall a nuanced, smartly written thriller.
Acknowledgment: St. Martin's Press provided a copy of The Trinity Six for this review.
Review Copyright © 2011 — Hidden Staircase Mystery Books — All Rights Reserved
Location(s) referenced in The Trinity Six: London, England, Moscow, Russia, Vienna, Austria, Berlin, Germany, Hungary
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The Trinity Six by Charles Cumming
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Format: Hardcover
ISBN-10: 0-312-67529-1
ISBN-13: 978-0-312-67529-5
Publication Date: March 2011
List Price: $24.99
Synopsis (from the publisher): London, 1992. Late one night, Edward Crane, 76, is declared dead at a London hospital. An obituary describes him only as a 'resourceful career diplomat'. But Crane was much more than that – and the circumstances surrounding his death are far from what they seem.
Fifteen years later, academic Sam Gaddis needs money. When a journalist friend asks for his help researching a possible sixth member of the notorious Trinity spy ring, Gaddis knows that she's onto a story that could turn his fortunes around. But within hours the journalist is dead, apparently from a heart attack.
Taking over her investigation, Gaddis trails a man who claims to know the truth about Edward Crane. Europe still echoes with decades of deadly disinformation on both sides of the Iron Curtain. And as Gaddis follows a series of leads across the continent, he approaches a shocking revelation – one which will rock the foundations of politics from London to Moscow …