I have to admit that some of the books that I've reviewed for Joe Bob were actual chores to get through. I'd find myself skimming pages at a time trying to get to something interesting enough to catch my attention. Fortunately, a few of the books have actually been enjoyable and I was happy to have had the chance to read them.

THE COMPANY by Robert Littell is easily the best novel that I've had the chance to review since I started doing this over a year ago. In fact, it is probably one of the best novels I've read in a couple of years. It is a cliche at this point in his career to compare Littell to John le Carre', especially since just about every reviewer seems to get around to doing just that. The guy can write!
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The Company by Robert Littell; reviewed by Steve Chaput
Published by Overlook Press; ISBN 1585671975

Robert Littell is no Tom Clancy and I mean that in only the best sense. Littell’s style and subject matter are probably closer to that of John le Carre than to the over-the-top action/adventure novels that Clancy & Company crank out. Just as le Carre’s George Smiley bore little resemblance to fellow Englishmen James Bond, Littell’s Jack McAuliffe bears little similarity to Clancy’s Jack Ryan. Don’t take this as a knock at Clancy, whose books I happen to enjoy. It’s just that like Ian Fleming did with his most famous creation, you can’t really take any of Clancy’s novels as a serious look at what ‘real’ intelligence agencies are doing.

While Littell’s CIA may use their fair share of high tech toys in their efforts to protect the homeland, McAuliffe and his fellow veterans of “Cockroach Alley” spend most of their days sitting in dinghy little offices going through the translated radio and phone messages of their counterparts in the Soviet Union. Beginning at the very beginning of what would become known as the Cold War, Jack and his fellow recruits into the newly created Central Intelligence Agency, find themselves in the very center of events that would make headlines and history. From the construction of the Berlin Wall, through the planning of the Bay of Pigs and on to the downfall of the Soviet Union, Littell shows us the inner workings of the CIA.

Not only does Littell introduce us to these Americans, he also allows us to see what may have been going on in the opposite camp. Along with Jack, Ebby and Leo (Littell’s Three Musketeers), we also meet Yevegny Tsipin (a second-generation KGB operative) and the mysterious spymaster Starik (the Old Man), both of whom believe that it is their role to bring down the U.S. for the glory of Communism and the Soviet Union. While the CIA sends Jack and the others around the world on various assignments, Yevegny finds himself secreted into the U.S. where he assumes several identities over the years as an undercover agent.

Littell shows us two generations of Company employees as they each make their mark on some of the incidents shaped the later part of the Twentieth Century. We see Jack, Leo and Ebby marry and watch as their sons and daughters each take their turns working to ‘make America safe from its enemies.” Whether you believe Littell’s version of events is up to you, but he certainly has done an amazing amount of research, leaving the reader to feel that things should have happened this way, even if they didn’t.

Along with his own cast of characters, Littell shows us glimpses of such actual American personages as JFK and his brother Robert, William Casey and Allen Dulles. We also get to meet more notorious folks such as Sam Giancana, Kenneth Philby and Vladimir Putin. Whether fictional or factual, Littell brings to all of these characters a sense of reality showing us human beings capable of all the vices and virtues we all share. In some cases it doesn’t really matter if the person is real or not, as they all leave an impression and impact on the story.

The novels’ 800 plus pages explore the Cold War and the personalities who helped shape several generations. Littell doesn’t soft-pedal nor vilify the CIA, as much as he shows us how human beings, usually attempting to do what they thought was right (or at least prudent) to move the political, economic and social events for a ‘greater purpose.’ Whether or not we believe in that purpose, isn’t important in the end. Littell rightly uses quotes and allusions to Lewis Carrol’s ALICE IN WONDERLAND through out, as the world in which these characters move about truly is something from the far side of the looking glass.

Four stars