Alan S. Cowell

5 stars: Super, couldn't put it down.

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From the back cover: Who was Alexander Litvinenko? What had happened in Russia since the end of the Cold War to make his life there untenable. And how did he really die? The life of Alexander Litvinenko provides a riveting narrative in its own right, culminating in an event that rang alarm bells among Western governments at the ease with which radioactive materials were deployed in a major Western capital to commit a unique crime. But it show more also evokes a wide range of other issues: Russia's lurch to authoritarianism, the return of the KGB to the Kremlin, the perils of a new cold war driven by Russia's oil riches and Vladimir Putin's thirst for power. Alan S. Cowell has written the definitive story of this assassination and of the profound international implications of this first act of nuclear terrorism. A masterful work of investigative reporting, "The Terminal Spy" offers unprecedented insight into one of the most chilling stories of our time.

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This book, the second on this case I've read, was a fabulous, frightening, detailed, fascinating read. It starts by following Litvinenko's tracks on the day he was poisoned (November 1, 2006) or as the book puts it "The day he began to die". It then starts at his formative years, slowly building up to November 2006 and beyond. The chapters on the actual murder, the effects of polonium, his 20 day torturous death, and the detective work tracing the polonium were engaging and unputdownable.

The book fingers Andrei Lugovoi, a former member of the KGB, as the one who provides the fatal dose. The evidence appeared compelling but of course, I am reading one point of view. The book makes it clear that the murder would have to be ordered by someone at the highest levels. Litvinenko himself fingered Putin (as Litvinenko also had shortly before lambasted Putin for the Anna Politkovskaya assassination). It is still unknown whether Putin had foreknowledge or whether the assassination was performed by someone else to please Putin.

The book is also exemplary as it gives a glimpse into present day Russia--which appears to be not too different from the Soviet Union. After skirting with a sort of democracy, it has slid back into authoritarian rule.

A book for my permanent collection. Highly recommended. show less

When I saw the Shelf Awareness ad for Alan Cowell’s The Terminal Spy, I only vaguely remembered the incident, and can’t say that the implications of the issue were at the forefront of my mind. Still, I found the premise interesting enough to want to read the book. I must say that it in no way disappointed.

The Terminal Spy, documenting the incident of an ex-KGB, Russian émigré’s poisoning death in London, reads like the best espionage thriller, full of shadowy characters and murderous show more intrigue.

The one thing that Cowell never lets us forget however is that this book is different from spy thrillers in one chilling aspect – it’s all real. Every place, event, action and most of all, every person is real. Alexander Litvinenko’s story was, in the long run, about parents mourning a child, a wife mourning a husband, children mourning the loss of a father, to paraphrase Cowell.

Cowell does a good job of outlining the history of all the key players related to the incident, including the poison itself. He does the same for the political history of Russia prior to and leading up to the incident.

While there was a lot of detail, I didn’t find myself tired of it, but rather wanting to read further. With one exception – in a probable attempt to keep the main personage and what happened to him at the forefront of the reader’s mind, Cowell has to find too many ways to refer to the day that Litvinenko was actually poisoned, and it did become redundant after about five or six references.

Nevertheless, I would recommend this book to anyone who wanted to gain a deeper insight into the Litvinenko incident, as well as anyone who enjoys a well-written, well-researched, solid piece of journalism. show less

If you've wondered what's like trying to be a journalist when journalism no longer has a sustainable business model this novel may be for you, but it had a lot of jargon that only another journalist would understand. Set in Paris it was less about the first person narrator and more about his craggy journalist counterparts who had their prime when journalism was still a raw and exciting industry rather than spend behind desks at a computer. I don't usually review books I haven't finished but show more I got 120 pages in and I didn't care what happened to any of these characters and felt I wasn't the audience for this book. Cowell can write but I wasn't interested in his subjects enough to continue. show less

The Terminal Spy: A True Story of Espionage, Betrayal, and Murder by Alan S. Cowell documents the events leading up to the radiological poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko two years ago in London's Millenium Hotel. The story was all over the international news at the time. Alan S. Cowell was the London Bureau Chief of the New York Times and covered the story, which eventually became this book.

This is the type of the book that I usually love. I've read quite a few accounts of various espionage show more services (CSIS, CIA, KGB, Mossad, MI6) as well as accounts of individuals caught up in international intrigue. This is a particular favourite topic of mine, and this book should have been a slam-dunk favourite. It wasn't.

It is not the subject, but Cowell's approach that is off-putting. Instead of allowing events and players to demonstrate the historic aspects of the poisoning, Cowell insists on reminding the reader that it is historic -- frequently. In addition to being repetitious, it leads me to conclude the exact opposite: that the incident wasn't so historic if the events and people can't be trusted to speak for themselves.

There are also many details included that distracted from the narrative. There is no need to include information such as the beverage consumed at an interview or the clothes an interviewee wore unless it is pertinent (it isn't). This is particularly frustrating because there are a lot of people to keep track of in this narrative, which is hard enough without extraneous information.

Most frustrating are Cowell's interjections as to what he imagines, with 20/20 hindsight, people are thinking or feeling at particular times in the timeline. These are things that Cowell has no way of knowing and these speculations don't offer any insight into the events in any case.

Terminal Spy is marketed as a "page-turning narrative," and it might have been were it not bogged down in details. If you can read around the details, there is interesting history here. I'll be passing on my copy to the military historian of the family to see what he can make of it.

See more of my reviews at Booklorn.com. show less