Synopses & Reviews
Paris, Moscow, Berlin, and Prague, 1937. In the back alleys of nighttime Europe, war is already under way. André Szara, survivor of the Polish pogroms and the Russian civil wars and a foreign correspondent for Pravda, is co-opted by the NKVD, the Soviet secret intelligence service, and becomes a full-time spymaster in Paris. As deputy director of a Paris network, Szara finds his own star rising when he recruits an agent in Berlin who can supply crucial information. Dark Star captures not only the intrigue and danger of clandestine life but the day-to-day reality of what Soviet operatives call special work.
Review
"A rich, deeply moving novel of suspense that is equal parts espionage thriller, European history and love story." The New York Times
Review
"Compelling....An excellent novel of history, betrayal and, most important, survival....While the story offers enough twists and turns to satisfy the most ardent spy fan, author Alan Furst transcends genre. This is a novel with heart." San Francisco Chronicle
Review
"This is a rich book, to be savored...for it is a work of an accomplished writer without obtrusively saying so on every other page. Furst has the instincts of the historian he likes to get his sequences right, he tells a story straight, and he believes that setting matters and the gifts of the storyteller." The Boston Globe
Review
"Kafka, Dostoyevsky, and le Carré sit up all night and talk to each other and this is what you get. It is absolutely wonderful." Kirkus Reviews
Review
"[I]ntelligent, provocative and gripping....Furst depicts the historical, geographic and political context in lucid and highly readable prose....His story is not a pretty one; but it is beautifully and compellingly told." Publishers Weekly
Review
"Entertaining, exciting, and thought-provoking reading." Library Journal
Review
"Dark Star never becomes one of those breathless adventures that build fake suspense around schemes to stop Hitler. Plot is less important than Furst's powerful descriptive writing....What carries the book to a level beyond the cynicism of spy novels is its ability to carry us back in time. Nothing can be like watching Casablanca for the first time. But Furst comes closer than anyone has in years." Walter Shapiro, Time
Review
"A page-churner of the best sort....Brilliant detail and sure sweep....Here is a thriller more deeply satisfying than much of the nonthrilling 'serious fiction' around today." Los Angeles Times Book Review
Review
"[Dark Star] explores the ambiguous moral ground familiar to readers of Graham Greene, Robert Stone, and le Carré....Terrific stuff poignant, moving, provocative." Adam Woog, The Seattle Times
Review
"The time-frame of the late 1930s on the Continent was once the special property of Eric Ambler and Graham Greene; Furst has ventured into their fictional territory and brought out a story that is equally original and engaging." Herbert Mitgang, The New York Times
Review
"One of the best spy novels Ive read in years....The novel is impeccably researched. Its as much historical fiction as it is spy fiction, and the atmosphere of danger and doom it creates by means of deftly employed historical details is matched only by the vividness of its mostly fictional characters. Dark Star doesnt merely evoke the period. Because of its engaging plot and appealing hero, it makes you live there, suffer there, and hope." Alan Cheuse, All Things Considered
Review
"Dark Star is as fine an evocation of prewar Europe as anything Ive ever read. An extremely well written and literate novel that practically creates a new genre: historical espionage." Nelson DeMille, author of The Gold Coast
Review
"Outclasses any spy novel I have ever read." Richard Condon, author of The Manchurian Candidate
Synopsis
Paris, Moscow, Berlin, and Prague, 1937. In the back alleys of nighttime Europe, war is already under way. André Szara, survivor of the Polish pogroms and the Russian civil wars and a foreign correspondent for Pravda, is co-opted by the NKVD, the Soviet secret intelligence service, and becomes a full-time spymaster in Paris. As deputy director of a Paris network, Szara finds his own star rising when he recruits an agent in Berlin who can supply crucial information. Dark Star captures not only the intrigue and danger of clandestine life but the day-to-day reality of what Soviet operatives call special work.
About the Author
Often compared to Graham Greene and Eric Ambler, Alan Furst is a master of the spy thriller and one of the great war novelists of our time. He is the author of Night Soldiers, Kingdom of Shadows, The Polish Officer, Red Gold, and The World at Night. He lives on Long Island, New York.
Reading Group Guide
1. The protagonist of Alan Fursts
Dark Star, Andre Szara, is a journalist for Pravda. Do you like the idea of a writer as a lead character? What might having a writer as the protagonist provide the story? What problems might it raise?
2. Consider Fursts use of suspense in Dark Star. How does he build suspense? Discuss different methods he uses in the novel.
3. Discuss the theme of heroism in the novel. How does Szara define the word? How does his definition compare with the way other characters understand the word?
4. Dark Star deals with the inability of German Jews to escape Nazi Germany by immigrating to other countries. In what ways does the novel suggest a broader responsibility for the fate of German Jews? What questions must a country consider before it can accept immigrant refugees?
5. Discuss the characters of General Bloch, Lady Angela Hope, Roddy Fitzware, Renate Braun, and the diplomat Von Polanyi as representatives of national secret services. In what ways are they similar? Different? What can you extrapolate about the service agency for which each one works?
6. Critics praise Fursts ability to re-create the atmosphere of World War II—era Europe. What elements of description make the setting come alive? How can you account for the fact that the settings seem authentic even though you probably have no firsthand knowledge of the times and places he writes about?
7. Fursts novels have been described as “historical novels,” and as “spy novels.” He calls them “historical spy novels.” Some critics have insisted that they are, simply, novels. How does his work compare with other spy novels youve read? What does he do that is the same? Different? If you owned a bookstore, in what section would you display his books?
8. Furst is often praised for his minor characters, which have been described as “sketched out in a few strokes.” Do you have a favorite in this book? Characters in his books often take part in the action for a few pages and then disappear. What do you think becomes of them? How do you know?
9. At the end of an Alan Furst novel, the hero is always still alive. What becomes of Fursts heroes? Will they survive the war? Does Furst know what becomes of them? Would it be better if they were somewhere safe and sound, to live out the war in comfort? If not, why not?
10. Love affairs are always prominent in Fursts novels, and “love in time of war” is a recurring theme. What role does the love affair play in Dark Star?
Author Q&A
Alan Furst describes the area of his interest as "near history." His novels are set between 1933 the date of Adolf Hitlers ascent, with the first Stalinist purges in Moscow coming a year later and 1945, which saw the end of the war in Europe. The history of this period is well documented. Furst uses books by journalists of the time, personal memoirs some privately published autobiographies (many of the prominent individuals of the period wrote them), war and political histories, and characteristic novels written during those years.
"But," he says, "there is a lot more" for example, period newsreels, magazines, and newspapers, as well as films and music, especially swing and jazz. "I buy old books," Furst says, "and old maps, and I once bought, while living in Paris, the photo archive of a French stock house that served newspapers of Paris during the Occupation, all the prints marked as cleared by the German censorship." In addition, Furst uses intelligence histories of the time, many of them by British writers.
Alan Furst has lived for long periods in Paris and in the south of France. "In Europe," he says, "the past is still available. I remember a blue neon sign, in the Eleventh Arrondissement in Paris, that had possibly been there since the 1930s." He recalls that on the French holiday le jour des morts (All Saints Day, November 1) it is customary for Parisians to go to the Père Lachaise Cemetery. "Before the collapse of Polish communism, the Polish émigrés used to gather at the tomb of Maria Walewska. They would burn rows of votive candles and play Chopin on a portable stereo. It was always raining on that day, and a dozen or so Poles would stand there, under black umbrellas, with the music playing, as a kind of silent protest against the communist regime. The spirit of this action was history alive as though the entire past of that country, conquered again and again, was being brought back to life."
The heroes of Alan Fursts novels include a Bulgarian defector from the Soviet intelligence service, a foreign correspondent for Pravda, a Polish cartographer who works for the army general staff, a French producer of gangster films, and a Hungarian émigré who works with a diplomat at the Hungarian legation in Paris. "These are characters in novels," Furst says, "but people like them existed; people like them were courageous people with ordinary lives and, when the moment came, they acted with bravery and determination. I simply make it possible for them to tell their stories."