An Imperfect Spy

Kate Fansler Mystery #11

by Amanda Cross

While guest-teaching a semester at Schuyler Law School, Kate Fansler gets to know an extraordinary secretary named Harriet, who patterns her life after John le Carré's character George Smiley. Harriet reveals that Schuyler has some serious skeletons swinging in its perfectly appointed closets, including the fate of Schuyler's only tenured female professor and a faculty wife who has killed her husband. As if Kate doesn't have enough to tackle, she is also up against the men who comprise the faculty of Schuyler itself--a thoroughly unapologetic bastion of white male power, mediocrity, and misogyny. Although she has only a few months on campus, Kate refuses to let Schuyler's rigid ideals and insistence on secrecy suppress her indefatigable curiosity--or her obsession with the truth.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Crime, Mystery Thriller, Womens, Espionage, Academia

Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1995

About the author

A psuedonym of Carolyn G. Heilbrun.

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.

Reviews

[Kathy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is my 11th reading of one of the 14 Kate Fansler mysteries. This book is not a mystery but a literary nod to John le Carré's Smiley couched within a treatise on women's equality very much of this book's publication date of 1995. Innocent readers of 2020 who were not around in the 90's can easily dismiss this book as boring and even confusing. I was around and do remember the 1995 world conference in Beijing working to gain gender equality. Obviously this was a recurring theme for this author, so if this crusade holds no interest, this book should be avoided.
Otherwise, we get Kate and Reed working at a law school in a temporary positions one summer. The men who run the school are painted with a broad and damaging brush.
It's just 151 pages, so that shortens the discontent. Mostly, even though I like the Kate Fansler character, this book does not work. I can almost envision the author sketching out the plot, adding events that might provide drama and then pasting it together to meet a deadline. The problem for me is -- she added some personality characteristics to Kate that are somewhat indigestible.
Can't recommend this one unless feminist struggle is your thing.
One incident at the school has someone pasting Kate's head onto a Hustler centerfold and passing it around the school and its male faculty. "The idea isn't shocking anymore; it's on a par with being told that all feminists hate men and won't wear makeup...it's the hatred and the fear. The degree to which some men are threatened by feminism."
The "spy" character of the book's title is an older woman who has followed Smiley's patterns in setting herself up with a new identity with a purpose and that purpose pulls Kate and Reed to that law school for a reason.

Library Loan

[Rachel N. · Rating 1 out of 5]

First off this is NOT a mystery. Nothing remotely resembling a mystery occurs in this book. Kate Fansler is a literature professor. Her husband Reed is teaching a law clinic at Schuyler law school and Kate decides to co-teach a law and literature class there for the semester. The book is essentially one long, boring case for feminism and how horribly women, at least in the 1990's, are treated at universities. The only vague hints of a mystery are that the only female teacher at the school was run over by a bus but this is quickly shown to be an accident. There are lots of random references to John Le Carre's books for no particular reason.
The whole law and literature class was ridiculous. Kate and her co-teacher Blair don't decide on the date and time for the class until the week ahead of time let alone what the class will be covering. A student randomly beats up Blair during class and Kate is not sure what they should do about it, how about report the student the police for assault and have him expelled from school. Nope, all she does is think Blair is sexy for beating the student up in return, gag. Kate also annoyed me because she thinks it's fine to cheat on her husband but gets extremely jealous when another woman flirts with him. I only finished this book because it is short and I thought something eventually must happen, I was wrong NOTHING happens. I'll definitely be avoiding this author in the future.

[Kim · Rating 2 out of 5]

I may be grumpy lately, but this is my second bad review of a favorite author today. In the other books in this series, I have really liked the character of Kate and her husband Reed. Funny, literate, liberal and honest. This Kate is NOT honest. I'm disappointed to find that she has had affairs during her marriage. And her excuse that she finds "constancy the important element in a relationship, fidelity less so" is self-serving and disingenuous. I'm afraid that I can't see the distinction and neither can my dictionary. The book ends up not even being a mystery, after all. We DO get to meet the wonderful Harriet in this book, though. She's a great character.

[Barbara · Rating 2 out of 5]

In back-filling my GR with books read decades ago, I suspect I am ranking many of them lower than I would have if ranked at the time. Ah well, so it goes; if I don't remember them well, I suspect they should get no more than "it was OK."

[Susana · Rating 2 out of 5]

Uma história que não me conseguiu cativar.

[Dennis Fischman · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a love story. The love between a wife and husband of mature years, between a mother and daughter, and even the love of literature that allows people to find wisdom for their own lives between the pages of a book: those are the heart of the story.

To the exact extent that love is a mystery, this book is a mystery, and not a bit more. It is not a whodunnit. We know from the start that Betty Osborne killed her husband, Fred. It is not a whydunnit. We know (although the faculty of Schuyler Law School, where he taught, try to dismiss it as too vulgar to regard) that he was abusing her and she killed him out of desperation, before "battered women syndrome" was named or understood. It is a bit of a spy story--the title is truth in advertising--and the epigraphs from John le Carré at the head of each chapter are well chosen and pertinent (as one would expect from a professor of literature writing spy fiction).

So, if you are interested in a 1995 feminist look at a stodgy law school, and if you're the kind of person who likes reading popular fiction that makes them want to reread Tess of the D’Urbervilles and Middlemarch and look up case law on sex discrimination, then this may be the perfect book for you!

But really, all we detectives do, amateur or professional, even private eyes, even the police, is change the direction of events. None of us really solves anything anymore, do we? We just try to alter history, however slightly. Now let me get that drink.

(203)

[Alison C · Rating 2 out of 5]

Kate Fansler is asked to co-teach a course on the law and literature at a not-very-good law school, while her husband Reed is leading a project there to aid women in prison in filing appeals for wrongful convictions. The school is unfortunately very sexist, with the only female law professor having recently died, ostensibly from a fall in front of a truck in New York City’s chaotic traffic; an older staff member, however, thinks this might not have been an accident and she asks Kate to investigate. The more Kate digs into the culture of the school, the more misogynistic she finds it, but whether that in itself is reason enough for murder is another question…. This novel, the eleventh in the series, was published in 1994 and to me was chiefly memorable for its bleak view of gender politics in the 1990s; I certainly don’t remember that time as being so very misogynistic, but then I was in San Francisco at the time, not NYC, so perhaps that accounts for it. In any event, Kate and Reed are also going through a rough patch in their marriage, which seems to stem from boredom more than anything else; I found that subplot kind of irritating. Each chapter is prefaced with a quote from John LeCarré’s work, involving espionage, but since I haven’t read those books, the allusions were lost on me. After the gem that was “The Players Come Again,” this one is a bit of a disappointment for me; mildly recommended, but really only for completist readers of the series.

[Kate McDougall Sackler · Rating 1 out of 5]

The time I spent reading this is time I will never get back. This was supposed to be a mystery, or at least involve some spying. Nothing close happened. A woman having a midlife crisis tries to make a death into a murder (it is not), then gets a closed case to be re-examined all while teaching a literature class in a law school full of misogynistic students and faculty. It probably didn’t help that I have never read anything by John Le carre, who this author obviously loves.
2019 reading challenge: a book you found in a little free library
Alphabet reading challenge: N- New York

[Don · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kate Fansler is a professor of English Literature and her husband, Reed, is a Law School professor. They are invited to teach one semester of Literature and Law for Kate and set up a clinic to help women in prison for Reed. The law school where they will be teaching is a mediocre one with a very conservative faculty. The one woman faculty member the law school had, was run over by a truck. Was she pushed? Kate meets a woman who works at the school who thinks she may have been murdered. Very intelligently written. Highly recommended.

[Meg Lynch · Rating 4 out of 5]

Now that I am almost done with the whole series, I can appreciate the evolution of the modern feminist movement, which is reflected in Cross's plots. This story in particular, which focuses on the struggle of women in an academic setting, although published in 1995, sounds not that dissimilar to some of what we read about harassment in the workplace.

[Margaret · Rating 4 out of 5]

Harriet the Spy, in a mystery whose title transparently is modelled after a le Carré title. Most of the quotes are by le Carré as well.
A more difficult subject, battered wives as well as male bastions of misogeny who in particular ignore older women.
A book worth reading, with a nice twist or two at the end.

[Roberta Havel · Rating 1 out of 5]

The Imperfect Spy is a poor excuse for a mystery. There was no flow to the disjointed plot. I felt no connection to the characters. The author tried to be intellectual by inserting a minute amount of Greek mythology and John Lecarre quotes and characters. These references didn’t make sense either. Don’t waste your time reading this short and unfulfilling book.

[Marsha Valance · Rating 4 out of 5]

While a visiting professor at an old-fashioned suburban law school where her husband Reed is organizing a legal clinic, Columbia University literature professor/amateur sleuth Kate Fansler becomes involved in the case of an abused faculty wife who, after shooting her law professor husband was deprived of a proper defense by a conspiracy of his law school colleagues.

[Lee Rozinski · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love the intellectual aspect of these books. Not only are they entertaining, good mysteries with interesting characters, they make me think. I always learn something when I read Ms. Fansler's novels.

[AM · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is a bit odd. There's a mystery, but it really feels like there are no stakes attached to it. I liked Katie and Reed - maybe I'll try one of the more traditional mysteries in the series some other time.

[Kerstin · Rating 2 out of 5]

Die Geschichte an sich war ganz interessant, aber die Doppelmoral der Protagonistin hat mich wirklich gestört.

[Roberta · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very engaging and well written mystery.

[Roxanna · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not my favorite, but a mediocre Amanda Cross mystery is still worth reading.

[Anne · Rating 4 out of 5]

The investigation in this one is rather roundabout. But the politics/feminism is so spot on it seems very current ( written in )1995

[Eileen McCauley · Rating 2 out of 5]

I remember Amanda Cross’ mysteries with fondness because a female English professor is the sleuth but this felt phoned in.

[John Stanley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very well written - very uninteresting. More intent on making her social point than writing a particularly good, or special, or all that entertaining story. Although this is the only book I have ever read by Carolyn Heilbrun (aka Amanda Cross), it’s pretty much what I would have expected now that I have read her bio.

[Susan · Rating 2 out of 5]

I liked the first two books I read by Amanda Cross but it seems she wears a little thin with prolonged exposure. Her characters are all surface, without growth or change so it's hard to care about them unless there's a constant supply of new ones. You may ask why i keep reading them. Book club.

[Mark Robertson · Rating 1 out of 5]

Even if I liked the character of Kate Fansler as described in this book I probably still would have awarded it only one star due to the absurdities in the plot and the weakness of the dialog. The author sets up ridiculous ultra-reactionary straw men that Kate helps to bring down while teaching law students to rage against the machine. This in 1995? The villains in this book are caricatures of villains from decades earlier. That said, it is the smug righteousness of the heroine (who is certainly willing to forgive herself her own weaknesses) that really made this book so hard to stomach. As for those absurd plot turns and awful dialog, I discuss a bit of each below - I don't think it's a spoiler, but if you haven't yet read this piece of trash you might not want to read further.



It's several weeks into the semester in which Kate, a visiting professor of literature, and Blair, a tenured law professor at a small law school in Manhattan (New York, not Kansas) are setting students' minds ablaze with their "revolutionary" discussions of gender and the law. A male law school student locks the classroom door, turns to Blair and says "I've had enough of your goddam bullshit and I'm going to show you how real men behave" and proceeds to assault the professor. Blair goes to the floor with the student-assailant on top of him. One female law student picks up a chair and begins to beat the assailant whose name, Kate remembers, is Jake. Kate and several other students follow her example and beat Jake with chairs until he rolls away from Blair, who gets on top of Jake and beats him with his fists. Once the dust settles, Jake explains "I've been listening to all this propaganda, cases where guys rape girls because the damn girls can't make up their minds even when your balls are blue. And what the hell are girls for anyway? You people, you and this crazy dame, are polluting the whole atmosphere of this law school and of the country, and I intend to put a stop to it."

So we've got an assault in the middle of a law school lecture. The assailant is set upon by several people swinging chairs, but doesn't appear to be particularly harmed by the beating he receives. He then stands and rationalizes the assault on the basis that the professor and his "crazy dame" sidekick are ruining the country by discussing rape when, after all, "what the hell are girls for anyway?"

It seems that Blair never reports the incident to the dean of the law school or to the police. For all we know, Jake returns to class the next week. Inside Kate's head we learn that her biggest takeaway from this incident is that she's turned on by Blair's "caveman" behavior.

If I could have given this book zero stars, I would have.

[Larinmtz · Rating 1 out of 5]

I kept seeing books by this author, and they looked so good. Finishing this one (the first one I've read) left me thinking of three words: rotten, propaganda, tripe.

An unsufferable main character does not make "elegant" and "polished" dialogue more tolerable (sorry, LA Times). A fighter for the poor and oppressed who is snobby? A bold woman who can cheat on her husband, yet raves against men who act that way and threatens her own husband's admirer? Hypocrite comes to mind.

Whether it's unbelievable and unlikeable characters, plot points that make no sense and come out of nowhere, or a storyline that hangs together on stereotype after stereotype, this book was a stinker. Of course it makes sense for the frustrated male law student to lock the lecture hall door and physically attack his professor in front of the class to "teach him how real men behave," because everybody knows that right-wingers can't actually think or discuss anything and are knuckle-dragging cave dwellers who occasionally wander into the bright halls of academia by accident (that's only one example). Cliche after cliche makes this book read like a manual for liberal journalists. I rolled my eyes more reading this book than my teen-agers do about chores.

So why did I finish it? Because it was short, and I'm trying to fill my library bingo card for the month. Once I was in far enough for the eye-rolling to begin I needed to finish it or I'd run out of time. February is a short month. I won't be reading any more of this author's work; if I want propaganda I'll open the newspaper--their articles are even shorter.

[Cassandra · Rating 3 out of 5]

Better than some, with much less annoying dialogue, an interesting plot, some relationship pieces I liked. I agree, the whole 'sexism in the law school' did not ring quite true -- although I think the people who find it unlikely in 1995 are forgetting that the entire Anita Hill/Clarence Thomas mess had just erupted a few years before this was written, and that in various places in the country (including a place I lived, and a law school I was aware of) the rhetoric that some of the students engage in was quite common. Things really were (and sometimes still are) that openly misogynistic, and to deny the reality of it is one of the factors which allows it to continue.

I do wish Kate Fansler was the same person throughout the entire series; Cross (for whatever reason, personal or professional) will not write her old, so she keeps her perpetually in her 40s or 50s, which means her birthdate and life experience have to keep shifting to adjust for the fact that the series was written over 30 years. So gone is the woman who clearly grew up during WW2 and went to college in the 50s and supported the student movement against her own family and class background, and instead we have someone less well defined, a Baby Boomer without the actual mental baggage of a boomer, and so much, much less interesting. I think Cross shot herself in the foot, somehow, because no matter how she writes Fansler, the fact that Cross herself was born in the 20s comes through and so a note of falseness creeps in. Still, I did enjoy it.

[Marti · Rating 3 out of 5]

i seem to have several of this series of books. this 212 page thin book is one i read while on the stationary bike. the heroine is somewhat likable, her husband a little stuffy. the most interesting person in the book is harriet, who is working as a supervisor of typists at the second rate law school. also interesting, with a smaller role, is the reclusive brother of the former sole female faculty member, who may or may not have died in an accident--perhaps it was murder. kate is teaching literature and law with a faculty member, and her husband, reed, is doing a clinic where he and students speak to female inmates to see if they cases could be revisited.

[George · Rating 3 out of 5]

A New York City university professor Kate Fansler mystery. Kate and her husband agree to teach at a city law school run by conservative males for a semester. She becomes involved in problems resulting from her feminist views, a mysterious older woman working at the school, and the case of a woman convicted of murdering her husband. This novel is less a mystery and more a story of Kate's "moody" behavior and series of experiences.

[MEK · Rating 2 out of 5]

I skimmed through this book because I never connected with Kate, the main character. She was moody and I never felt her character was solid. I did, however, like the Imperfect Spy of the title. (No spoilers here). Kate is not particularly nice and I wouldn't want to know her. I totally agree with Hayes's review below...

[Rdonn · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have always liked Amanda Cross mysteries. They are so literate. This mystery has quotations from John LeCarre before each chapter, one character identifies with George Smiley, another with Hardy's Tess. There are references to other authors and one to Greek mythology. There are many subplots and is a very intriguing mystery.

[Suzanne · Rating 5 out of 5]

I hadn't read any of Amanda Cross's elegant mysteries in a couple of years and just casually picked this one up. My goodness, I've been missing some fun. I was enchanted to see all the quotes she uses from a favorite author of mine, John LeCarre. The story is twisty and surprising and features characters with real dimensions. This is a good read!