The Polish Officer

This is my favorite of Alan Furst's books because of the main character and it is one complete story. Some of his books are rather episodic.
'Captain de Milja was a soldier, he knew he didn't have long to live. And, in truth, he didn't care. He was not in love with life. One or two things had to be taken care of, then matters could run their course'.
'De Milja looked to be in his thirties, but there was something about him, some air of authority, that was much older than that ... His face was delicate, arrogant, hard ... in any event, he was a very serious man.'
Like a lot of the author's characters, they seem doomed but do survive or at least, are alive at the end of the book and sometimes make a brief appearance in some of his other books, especially as in 'The Foreign Correspondant'. It would be good to encounter Captain De Milja again.

Dark, Paranoid, Wonderful (19/19 people found this helpful)

Having read "Night Soldiers" and "Dark Star" I leapt upon this novel with a huge amount of anticipation. Usually whenever I do this I am let down in some way, but Mr Furst has that most sought after of qualities in an author: consistency.
The Polish Officer in question is a wonderfully understated character, merely trying to do what's best in a more-than-uncertain world. With his loyalties lying with "a country with a bully for a neighbour" he seeks out the best underground way possible to continue fighting for it, be it against the Russian NKVD or the German Gestapo. We are taken along for the ride across a war-torn Europe, wondering much as he does as to when he is going to be killed, rather than if. He survives long enough for us to empathise with him and his situation. He is like we would be; ordinary but using it to his advantage. He underlines the fact that a James Bond in his situation would be merely a name on a headstone.

This is an excellent spy novel. This is an excellent war-story. But above all it is an excellent tale from an excellent author

Fine novel of espionage in Occupied Europe (15/15 people found this helpful)

This is the first novel I've read by Alan Furst, and I was pleased to find that the golden opinions which Furst has been winning (comparisons with Le Carre, among others) seem to be justified. He writes unobtrusively well, and the period in which the novel is set offers almost too much material for the thriller writer.

For the English or American reader, life in Occupied Europe from the perspective of those who lived there is still an unfamiliar angle from which to view the Second World War, and I found Furst's treatment a refreshing change from the usual Anglocentric perspective. There are no English or American characters of any significance; instead the focus of interest is upon the emigres and displaced persons, the former military officers and bandits who find themselves more or less willingly drawn into an apparently hopeless resistance to the occupying Nazi and Soviet forces in France, Poland, Russia and the Ukraine. It is a small triumph that Furst makes this unfamiliar material compelling to the English reader.

I would add only one caveat; the author's somewhat curious decision to limit his period of interest to that between roughly 1938 and 1941, (broadly, that in which the Axis powers were most clearly in the ascendant) although defensible in dramatic terms, left this reader at the novel's end with a strong feeling that the whole story had not been told. I understand that Alan Furst's other, and now rather numerous, novels are set in the same period, and one wonders how long it will be before he begins to feel constrained by this self-imposed restriction. Certainly the central character of The Polish Officer is strong enough to justify at least one sequel, and perhaps to set the mind at rest.

It is a measure of the author's success that one badly wants to know for certain that his hero survives the war. I will certainly be seeking out this author's other books, though I will be surprised if they are superior.

Good story, very dodgy historical research (7/17 people found this helpful)

Alan Furst is a good author - well worth reading. This is a good story but he does let himself down with his research - the main bit which grated with me was his description of Lancaster bombers attacking the Operation Sea Lion fleet - I don't think they were in service until 1942. Makes me wonder what other research he skimped on...

Alan Furst

Reader Reviews:

Sheer class (0/0 people found this helpful)

Dark, Paranoid, Wonderful (19/19 people found this helpful)

Fine novel of espionage in Occupied Europe (15/15 people found this helpful)

Good story, very dodgy historical research (7/17 people found this helpful)

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