Convergence

by Jack Fuller

"A brilliant achievement. . . .Like the best work of Greene and Le Carré, it is more than genre fiction; it is literature. . . .[Convergence] is the most plausible, and perhaps the best spy novel ever written by an American." --Arthur Maling, Chicago Tribune

"An intelligent, readable novel about two kinds of intrigue--international and bureaucratic. He succeeds admirably at both tasks." --Ross Thomas, Washington Post

"A solid, provocative first novel about the 'deadly game of espionage' . . . Thoughtfulness and human frailty take precedence over action and suspense. Irony is the prevailing mode. . . . Fuller depicts intelligence work—its technical minutiae and its vaunted goals—convincingly. And he subtly weaves various parallels into complementary layers of potential convergence." --Jeffrey Burke, Wall Street Journal

"A fast-moving, dramatic, thinking person's spy novel." --Nelson DeMille, Newsday

Mass Market Paperback

Published February 12, 1984

About the author

Jack Fuller published six critically acclaimed novels and one book of non-fiction about journalism. He was a legal affairs writer, a war correspondent in Vietnam, a Washington correspondent, and a Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial writer.

Three of his novels have been included in the University of Chicago Press’s distinguished Phoenix Fiction series. In 2005, he retired from a career in newspapers to concentrate on book writing.

He began working in journalism at the age of 16 as a copyboy for the Chicago Tribune. Along the way he has worked for the Washington Post, Chicago Daily News, City News Bureau of Chicago, and Pacific Stars and Stripes. He left journalism for law briefly when U.S. Attorney General Edward Levi asked him to serve as his special assistant in the Department of Justice. At the Chicago Tribune he served as editor of the editorial page, editor, and publisher. When he retired, he was president of Tribune Publishing Co.

A graduate of Northwestern University and Yale Law School, he lived in Chicago with his wife, Debra Moskovits. He had two children, Tim and Kate.

Reviews

[Ebenmaessiger · Rating 5 out of 5]

a v. smart, claustrophobic, almost overly restrained 70s spy tale. featuring men full of ambition and devoid of ideology, fuller positions the superpower contretemps as largely one of paranoiac one-upmanship and incessant jockeying for internal leverage. the way in and degree to which it “slows down” over the final 100 pages could easily be praised or bemoaned — one’s take will depend on that reaction.

[Martin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Insular, intelligent espionage story with that declarative, unglib quality in my experience found exclusively in the fiction of the 1970s and thereabouts. Notable for being unrelated to the Le Carré lineage, and also about the CIA and not MI6. Recommended.

[Kurishin · Rating 5 out of 5]

It is a shame that this isn't more well read. A literary thriller that is of original style and development. It gets the 5 stars because of what it is versus its lesser thriller peers and also because it deserves greater attention.