- Hardcover: 320 pages
- Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC (6 April 2009)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0747597081
- ISBN-13: 978-0747597087
- Product Dimensions: 22 x 14 x 3.4 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 253,102 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
The Spy Game
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||
Did you know you can trade in your old books for an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card to spend on the things you want? Plus, get an extra £5 Gift Certificate when you trade in books worth £10 or more before June 30, 2012. Visit the Books Trade-In Store for more details. |
Product details |
More About the Author
Product Description
Review
`In her finely composed second novel, Harding conjures up the enigmatic home life of eight-year-old Anna Wyatt and her older brother Peter. An aching, delicate and affecting interpretation of loss and acceptance'
--Kirkus
`The most elegant novel of the year. Two children concoct a theory about their mother's past that might not, we learn, be entirely fantasy. With subtly dispatched wisdom, it asks the question, what do we really know about our parents?' -- Independent
--Kirkus
`The most elegant novel of the year. Two children concoct a theory about their mother's past that might not, we learn, be entirely fantasy. With subtly dispatched wisdom, it asks the question, what do we really know about our parents?' -- Independent
Review
'It is the calm quietness of her writing that is so appealing - she lays an image down so gently that it floats in the mind long after' Margaret Forster 'Very impressive, moving and beautifully written. A subtly understated account of a complex childhood' Charles Palliser Praise for The Solitude of Thomas Cave: 'Masterpiece' - Daily Telegraph, 'A modern classic' - Brian Patten
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Browse and search another edition of this book.
Browse and search another edition of this book.
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
9 of 10 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
The direct gaze of the woman sipping a cup of tea on the dustjacket of the UK hardback, really caught my eye - a spendid cover and evocative title too. Reading the blurb, expected an espionage story straight out of John Le Carre, but this thoughtful and slow-burning novel is something completely different.
Set in the post-war years of the Cold War, Anna's mother goes out in the car in the fog, and she never sees her again. The same day, a spy case breaks in the news, and this leads Anna's brother Peter to wonder if she was a sleeper, a spy in deep-cover waiting to be called into action. He can't believe she died in a car accident - he's sure she's alive somewhere with a different identity.
Their mother was a refugee from eastern Germany - with no family left - that's all they know about her; their rather distant father prefers to disappear into his garden. This allows Peter to obsess about an alter ego for her - who she may have been meeting, what she may have been involved in. Anna is confused and feels her mother's loss strongly, but goes along with her brother's game. Eventually Peter goes off to boarding school, but he's still haunted by his imaginings. The children grow up, grow apart and start families of their own. When Anna's father dies, she feels a need for closure with her mother too, and plans to visit Konigsberg where she was born ...
This profound and subtle novel explores loss and letting go. You feel a little of what it was like to be a 'German' or Eastern European in England after the war, that slight strangeness and not quite fitting in, that led Peter's imagination into overload. Beautifully written, it takes its time getting to its conclusion, concentrating on the motherless siblings and how it affects their lives.
Set in the post-war years of the Cold War, Anna's mother goes out in the car in the fog, and she never sees her again. The same day, a spy case breaks in the news, and this leads Anna's brother Peter to wonder if she was a sleeper, a spy in deep-cover waiting to be called into action. He can't believe she died in a car accident - he's sure she's alive somewhere with a different identity.
Their mother was a refugee from eastern Germany - with no family left - that's all they know about her; their rather distant father prefers to disappear into his garden. This allows Peter to obsess about an alter ego for her - who she may have been meeting, what she may have been involved in. Anna is confused and feels her mother's loss strongly, but goes along with her brother's game. Eventually Peter goes off to boarding school, but he's still haunted by his imaginings. The children grow up, grow apart and start families of their own. When Anna's father dies, she feels a need for closure with her mother too, and plans to visit Konigsberg where she was born ...
This profound and subtle novel explores loss and letting go. You feel a little of what it was like to be a 'German' or Eastern European in England after the war, that slight strangeness and not quite fitting in, that led Peter's imagination into overload. Beautifully written, it takes its time getting to its conclusion, concentrating on the motherless siblings and how it affects their lives.
8 of 9 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
`Fog that morning, a freezing fog; the flagstones dark and slippery outside the door.'
Anna, the narrator, remembers a `Monday in January during the Cold War'. She remembers `a sting in the air that touched closer than the kiss she gave me, which was no more than a brush of breath and powdered cheek' as she says good bye to her mother for the last time.
Georgina Harding's writing is perfect in its evocation of the feeling of the cold war years. The first section settles into the time after their mother's death; others are damaged in the post war years. Anna's best friend Susan has parents who were interned in a Japanese POW camp. Her music teacher escaped from Germany and the concentration camps. In the midst of the family tragedy Peter is sent off to boarding school. The children are considered too young to go to the funeral and Peter becomes convinced that his mother was a spy, bound up in the Portland affair which surfaced at the same time.
We recently had William Boyd's Restless where the narrator finds that her mother was in intelligence during the war. In this novel Peter and Anna play the 'Spy Game' as children, collecting evidence on their mother, fueled by the wish for her to be alive somewhere, even if not with them.
And then in the last section Anna, now past fifty investigates the mystery about their mother and finds all is not straightforward...
I thought Georgina Harding has done a masterly job with this novel. It is poignant in its exploration of loss, of a child's view of complex events and of the family's relationships. I found the story of Mrs Cahn, the piano teacher particularly moving.
A fine and gripping novel.
Anna, the narrator, remembers a `Monday in January during the Cold War'. She remembers `a sting in the air that touched closer than the kiss she gave me, which was no more than a brush of breath and powdered cheek' as she says good bye to her mother for the last time.
Georgina Harding's writing is perfect in its evocation of the feeling of the cold war years. The first section settles into the time after their mother's death; others are damaged in the post war years. Anna's best friend Susan has parents who were interned in a Japanese POW camp. Her music teacher escaped from Germany and the concentration camps. In the midst of the family tragedy Peter is sent off to boarding school. The children are considered too young to go to the funeral and Peter becomes convinced that his mother was a spy, bound up in the Portland affair which surfaced at the same time.
We recently had William Boyd's Restless where the narrator finds that her mother was in intelligence during the war. In this novel Peter and Anna play the 'Spy Game' as children, collecting evidence on their mother, fueled by the wish for her to be alive somewhere, even if not with them.
And then in the last section Anna, now past fifty investigates the mystery about their mother and finds all is not straightforward...
I thought Georgina Harding has done a masterly job with this novel. It is poignant in its exploration of loss, of a child's view of complex events and of the family's relationships. I found the story of Mrs Cahn, the piano teacher particularly moving.
A fine and gripping novel.
8 of 9 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
This is an evocative, perceptive and sensitive novel which deserves to be put forward for some major prizes. The author reminds us of the powerlessness of children and the way they can misinterpret and draw conclusions which are often far from the truth because of their lack of experience and context. Childhood bereavement is at the centre of the story which is set in postwar Britain. Her writing is wonderful.
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
Book spoilt by spelling mistakes in kindle edition
i love my kindle but seriously who checks the electronic edition -- the spelling mistakes were rife --- instead of capital Is there were 1s! Read more
Published 23 days ago by R. Webb
Shadows of the Past
A curiously haunting novel about mourning and memory, and about how the borders between fantasy and reality can often blur in a troubled mind. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Kate Hopkins
Mysterious and beautifully written
Having read Harding's `Solitude of Thomas Cave' I was at once impressed and drawn in by her exquisite style of writing I came to read the `Spy Game. Read more
Published 23 months ago by r.m.piper
Coolness and mystery down the generations
Georgine Harding is definitely a precise and careful writer to watch.
She covers a similar territory to both Spies (Michael Frayn)and Restless (William Boyd) Frayn's... Read more
She covers a similar territory to both Spies (Michael Frayn)and Restless (William Boyd) Frayn's... Read more
Published on 18 Nov 2009 by Lady Fancifull
Intelligent and engaging
This is an intelligent and engaging novel that revolves around the mysterious 'death' of a young mother in the early 1960s. Read more
Published on 3 July 2009 by D. P. Mankin
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
|
|
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
