Stealing Thunder

by Peter Millar

Gottesfeuer - bk662; Bastei Lübbe; Peter Millar; pocket_book; 2004

Genres: Thriller, Fiction

Paperback

First published March 15, 1999

About the author

Peter Millar is an award-winning British journalist, author and translator, and has been a correspondent for Reuters, Sunday Times and Sunday Telegraph. He was named Foreign Correspondent of the Year for his reporting on the dying stages of the Cold War, his account of which – 1989: The Berlin Wall, My Part in its Downfall – was named ‘best read’ by The Economist. An inveterate wanderer since his youth, Peter Millar grew up in Northern Ireland and studied at Magdalen College, Oxford. Before and during his university years, he hitchhiked and travelled by train throughout most of Europe, including behind the Iron Curtain to Moscow and Leningrad, as well as hitchhiking barefoot from Dubrovnik to Belfast after being robbed in the former Yugoslavia. He has had his eyelashes frozen in the coldest inhabited place on Earth - Oymyakon, eastern Siberia, where temperatures reach minus 71ºC, was fried at 48ºC in Turkmenistan, dipped his toes in the Mississippi, the Mekong and the Nile, the Dniepr and the Danube, the Rhine and the Rhone, the Seine and the Spree. He crisscrossed the USA by rail for his book All Gone To Look for America and rattled down the spine of Cuba for Slow Train to Guantanamo. He has lived and worked in Paris, Brussels, Berlin, Warsaw and Moscow, attended the funerals of two Soviet leaders, been blessed six times by Pope John Paul II (which would have his staunch Protestant ancestors spinning in their graves), and he has survived multiple visits to the Munich Oktoberfest and the enduring agony of supporting Charlton Athletic. Peter speaks French, German, Russian and Spanish, and is married with two grown-up sons. He splits his time between Oxfordshire and London, and anywhere else that will have him.

Reviews

[Mike · Rating 2 out of 5]

A rather confused plot with a rather abrupt and unsatisfying ending.

[Avid Series Reader · Rating 1 out of 5]

A parallel tale of 1945 and 1995: of Klaus Fuchs, German-born scientist on the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos, and Eamonn Burke, Irish-American-born journalist in London, investigating whether Klaus Fuchs, who gave the technical details of the atomic bomb to the Soviets, did not die a natural death as officially reported behind the Iron Curtain.

In 1945, with the belief that scientific knowledge should be shared, Klaus Fuchs passes the critical atomic bomb details to Soviet spy "Raymond" (Harry Gold), per telephone instructions from Soviet master spy “John”. Klaus Fuchs and Harry Gold meet at first on the eastern seaboard, then later in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Klaus’ life on “The Hill” is described, including the suspicion held by Robert Oppenheimer and Niels Bohr that Klaus Fuchs might be a spy, and the “gadget” test at Trinity.

Harry Gold delivered a letter to Air Force B-29 pilot Joshua Finch at Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque New Mexico, and acted as go-between to receive and pass on a “toolkit” using the pretense of roadside aid to stranded motorists.

In 1995, magazine journalist Sabine Kotzke hires Eamonn Burke to find out who murdered Klaus Fuchs and why. Eamonn and Sabine travel to Harwell in the English countryside, to interview a woman known as “Nuclear Winter” who worked with Klaus Fuchs. They fly to Albuquerque New Mexico to check the 1945 guest book at Conrad Hilton’s original hotel, and drive up to Los Alamos to interview Hiram Carter, a scientist who worked with Klaus Fuchs on the Manhattan Project. As they travel to Moscow then Iceland to solve the mystery of Fuchs’ murder, they uncover a deeper secret beyond the publicized treason. Attempts on their lives alert them that someone is trying to protect the secrets of 1945. Eamonn’s Russian contact Valery leads Eamonn to discover the truth at a monastery in Germany.

Peter Millar weaves fact with fiction, suggesting explanations for gaps in known history, such as the unknown 'Perseus' listed in the Appendix. To fully appreciate all the plot threads and conspiracy theories, the reader needs to be familiar with WWII military campaigns and generals, political treaties and national leaders of the time, the Manhattan Project, the US, British, Russian and German intelligence organizations, etc. Not having that extensive specialized knowledge, I can only presume the story was well researched, and I found the last third of the book tiresome with its repetitive theme of betrayal and counter-betrayal. Millar apparently intended to suggest WWII was not won by “the good guys”, nor did it end for the right reasons.

[Margherita Dolcevita · Rating 4 out of 5]

Iniziare un libro identificandosi con la ragazza morta non fa presagire bene, tuttavia il romanzo mi è piaciuto e anche molto. Credevo fosse una cosa da tagliarsi le vene e invece non è così, qualche lacrimuccia nel finale, ma per il resto il libro è simpatico, divertente, fa riflettere, l'ho gradito e letto tutto d'un fiato.