Nemesis -- that inescapable agent of downfall, of retribution and vengeance
Within this cauldron of culmony, treachery and deadly connivance is a cracking tale to be told
Once again Rory Clements, superb craftsman of word, plot and atmosphere, tells it as it should be.
He entwines the world of academia with the dark corridors of espionage and deception, of MI5, counter intelligence, Special Branch and and all the accoutrements of the "dark world"
Not one to dissemble he opens with the masterly setting of Cambridge King's College great chapel and the meliflous tones of a teenage boy choristor with a "voice from heaven".
Add the under-the sheets goings on of the father of a future president, Ambassador Joe Kennedy, and a seedy-looking French labourer with a mysterious message then you have all the precusors to an intriguing tale
In this typically ingenious scene setting author Rory Clements prepares his readers for another mix of intrigue and action, this time with Professor Tom Wilde in the cloisters of pre-war espionage.
This scenario clearly comports with the
atmosphere and literary endeavour of Nucleus and Corpus.
This is Cambridge circe 1939 and the university town is caught in a web of plotting, of families in crisis, and of wartime snooping and spivs -- and a timely twist in the heart of the don-cum - spycatcher - cum detective.
This is brought on by the
the spy who came back from the contratemps of civil war in Spain into the bosom of his former Biggles-like world of blimpish, moustachioed countryfied gentry who are constantly reminding all and one that "there's a war on".
As Clements sets his tale in the birthing stages of the Second World War there is a
strange prescience of the coming scourge of the swastika -- anecdotes of the evils of Hitler that appear to be known rather early in the conflict.
Would the ordinary folk of England have been aware of this while only at the opening skirmishes of battle?
Another small quirk of historical unease( not germane to the novel but left me wondering) was reference to pro German sentiment by a minister of the South African government.
Being born a South African this reviewer was a tad intrigued.
The South African Prime Minister
J. B. M. Hertzog had put his case to the National Assembly for South Africa to remain neutral in the Second World War, against Jan Smuts who supported a Commonwealth alliance.
When Smuts became the fourth Prime Minister of South Africa for the second time the National Assembly voted on a motion whether or not to join the war and Jan Smuts won by 13 votes.
The Union of South Africa declared war on Germany.
South Africa under Smuts knew where it stood.
To return to Nemisis
The subtle, scenic nature of this land and the ambience of Britain -- call it England -- in the very early days of Hitler's war on Europe -- permeates throughput.
It is this quintessential Englishness in beautiful sculptured prose in both description and dialogue that draws one to the character and plot.
Take Professor Wilde, essentially an American but so imbued in the academia of Cambridge that he is a very modern Brit (circa 1939) with a conscience that seeks to be assuaged.
Hence his slueth-like pursuit of the underworld of espionage that dares to infiltrate the cloistered climes of rural Suffolk.
He matches the mascinations of the celebrum with the contusion of the ego.
For this is after all a spy thriller filled with historical overtones.
There is intrigue, connivances and complots almost "In extremis".
To tell more would be to deny the pleasure of discovery.
Let that be the task of Mr Clements.