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THE DRAGON, THE BEAR AND THE TIGER For espionage veteran Kenneth Aubrey the world is suddenly full of clues that don't match up. A Chinese defector hauled from Hong Kong harbour trading asylum for the communist mandarins' betrayal. The nerve-cracking interrogation, smoking out the truth from a network of disinformation. Aubrey is in a hall of mirrors with doors leading back 40 years to the time when Aubrey was the prisoner of the traitor he is hunting to his lair. In six months Aubrey could show more crack the defector. But he doesn't have months, he has weeks. Two weeks before the Berlin Wall is bulldozed into history. Two weeks to break the three-cornered death game between China, Russia and the West. Two weeks to fight the dragon and the bear with the West's most crucial mission, Jade Tiger. show lessTags
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Member Reviews
Slow. Almost Le Carre in style but not as well crafted. I think it is at least the second novel to feature the protagonists because they seem to have some prior history that is not explained.
The book was published in '82, only seven years before Berlin Wall was demolished and a united Germany entered NATO and the EU without the world coming to an end. It just goes to show how quickly the unimaginable can come to pass.
In Germany the latest Prime Minister accompanied by his deputy Wolf Zimmerman, are on an election tour with the manefesto of ratifying the Berlin Treaty to dismantle the wall. Meanwhile in Britsh ruled Hong Kong, a chinese party official is fished from the waters and claims that when Zimmerman recently visited china, he show more was interogated and found to be a KGB spy. This raises horrible questions - is the entire berlin Treaty a KGB plot to disarm the West. In the remaining 10 days the truth must be found. Kennith AUbry and Patrick Hyde attempt to track down Zimmerman's past while an american infiltrator attempts to determine the truth of Wei's claims.
The 'voice' jumps around a lot between the major characters, and disruptively sneaks into the russian and german heads as well, but the biggest downside is that the 'plot' is resolved about halfway through the book, leaving the remaining half as a series of Patrick's escapades to find information the reader already knows. Combined with Audry's remeniscences into the 1940s and some very sterotypical russians and a Zimmermans' bizarre past, it all just doesn't hang together well enough.
That said it is quite a readable cold war espionage thriller, aubrey is pretty much the archtypical spymaster, and Hyde the intelligent active hero - it's just that the combination doesn't really work well together. Whilst the russians are somewhat poor, the chinese have been better detailed, and C Thomas' obvious experiences in asia do come through.
Nowhere near as good as the technological thriller of Firefox that made him famous, it also doesn't reach the heights of LeCarre's cold war paranoia, and has now dated badly. show less
The book was published in '82, only seven years before Berlin Wall was demolished and a united Germany entered NATO and the EU without the world coming to an end. It just goes to show how quickly the unimaginable can come to pass.
In Germany the latest Prime Minister accompanied by his deputy Wolf Zimmerman, are on an election tour with the manefesto of ratifying the Berlin Treaty to dismantle the wall. Meanwhile in Britsh ruled Hong Kong, a chinese party official is fished from the waters and claims that when Zimmerman recently visited china, he show more was interogated and found to be a KGB spy. This raises horrible questions - is the entire berlin Treaty a KGB plot to disarm the West. In the remaining 10 days the truth must be found. Kennith AUbry and Patrick Hyde attempt to track down Zimmerman's past while an american infiltrator attempts to determine the truth of Wei's claims.
The 'voice' jumps around a lot between the major characters, and disruptively sneaks into the russian and german heads as well, but the biggest downside is that the 'plot' is resolved about halfway through the book, leaving the remaining half as a series of Patrick's escapades to find information the reader already knows. Combined with Audry's remeniscences into the 1940s and some very sterotypical russians and a Zimmermans' bizarre past, it all just doesn't hang together well enough.
That said it is quite a readable cold war espionage thriller, aubrey is pretty much the archtypical spymaster, and Hyde the intelligent active hero - it's just that the combination doesn't really work well together. Whilst the russians are somewhat poor, the chinese have been better detailed, and C Thomas' obvious experiences in asia do come through.
Nowhere near as good as the technological thriller of Firefox that made him famous, it also doesn't reach the heights of LeCarre's cold war paranoia, and has now dated badly. show less
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Author Information
32+ Works 4,060 Members
Craig Thomas was born in Cardiff, England in 1942, and was educated at Cardiff High School and University College, Cardiff. After completing his MA on Thomas Hardy, he went into teaching. Throughout his eleven years teaching English, Thomas longed to go into writing. At first he began to write only occasionally, producing a number of scripts for show more radio and TV, all of which were rejected. Eventually, after pleading with a script editor for some advice, he was told he could write, but not for radio. The script editor told him to attempt to write a novel. Thomas just happened to have an idea for a thriller which he has wanted to try as a radio serial. Instead, he turned it into a novel after eighteen months. The manuscript became Rat Trap, Thomas' first published novel. But it was Thomas' second novel, Firefox, which made him a best-seller both in England and the U.S., and enabled him to become a professional novelist. An American paperback house paid a significant sum for the book, and Clint Eastwood turned it into a movie. It was the first techno-thriller and the first action story to be set mainly in the Soviet Union. Thomas left teaching in 1977, having already completed his third novel, Wolfsbane. However, it was with his fourth novel, Snow Falcon, that Thomas claims he found his own voice. Thomas' subsequent books, including The Bears Tears, Winter Hawk, All the Grey Cats, The Last Raven and A Hooded Crow, all spring from his interest in "speculations" on geopolitical tensions and conflicts. His fourteen best-selling novels have consistently attracted praise and he is generally credited with creating the genre of the 'techno-thriller' with his novel Firefox. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Series
Common Knowledge
- Original publication date
- 1982
- People/Characters
- Patrick Hyde; Kenneth Aubrey
- Important places
- Hong Kong
- Important events
- Berlin Treaty
- Dedication
- Hard is the Journey
Hard is the Journey,
So many turnings,
And now where am I? - First words
- The senior foreign operations officer from the Ministry of Public Tranquility reached his slim, long fingered hand into the pool of light cast by the anglepoise lamp at the edge of the desk.
- Last words
- (Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)He failed to hear the arrival of the Guardia Civil truck in the carpark outside.
Classifications
Statistics
- Members
- 150
- Popularity
- 217,320
- Reviews
- 2
- Rating
- (3.54)
- Languages
- Dutch, English, German
- Media
- Paper, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 15
- ASINs
- 5
