Mercury Pictures Presents by Anthony Marra

Published by Hogarth on August 2, 2022

Mercury Pictures Presents is a sprawling but tightly controlled novel. Set before and during the Second World War, most key characters are Italian immigrants, although one is an American-born citizen of Chinese ancestry. While the novel is centered around a minor movie studio owned by two estranged brothers, its grand theme is America’s dependence upon and distrust of immigrants. That theme is captured in this description of an immigrant character: “There was nothing he wasn’t willing to fail at. Besides denying his racism, it was his most American quality.”

The brothers who co-founded Mercury Pictures are Artie and Ned Feldman. They had success making silent movies, but larger studios surpassed them with talkies. Ned works in New York handling the financial side of the business. Artie is in Los Angeles, overseeing the operation of the studio. Maria Lagana is Artie’s head of production, having worked her way up from typist.

Maria’s mother fled Italy with Maria when Mussolini exiled Maria's father, a prominent lawyer, to an internment colony in the Italian hinterlands. While in exile, Maria’s father saved young Nino Picone from drowning. He arranges for Nino’s informal adoption by the Cortese family. Nino works as a photographer, often taking passport photos that will be used in forged passports. He plans to travel to America with Maria’s father, who has acquired a forged passport of his own. That plan falls apart but, thanks to an act of sacrifice, Nino comes to America using the passport of Vincent Cortese.

The novel opens with Maria trying to get a proposed Mercury Pictures film approved by the Production Code Administration, a censor that, like the Senate, regards Hollywood as anti-American. Maria is the brains behind some of Mercury’s best films but she can’t get a producer credit, much less an executive position and decent salary, because of her gender. Maria lives with Eddie Lu, an American actor of Chinese ancestry who can’t get a decent role until after Pearl Harbor, when he becomes typecast playing Japanese villains.

Nino has been in the US for three years before he finds the courage to track down Maria in California. Maria blames Nino for abandoning her father but, for reasons she doesn’t quite understand, gives him a job as a photographer at Mercury. Nino works under his assumed identity but is always at risk of being exposed and perhaps branded as an Italian spy.

Foreign spies are on everyone’s mind. One of Mercury’s propaganda films claims that 25,000 Japanese residents of Los Angeles were sabotaging America, justifying the nation’s horrific internment of Japanese Americans because of their ancestry. The hatred that fuels wars causes Mercury to lose German and Italian employees because wartime laws prevent them from working with cameras or chemicals. Maria must carry an enemy alien registration card and will be arrested if she travels outside a small zone in LA.

The plot is a collection of memorable scenes and vignettes. Eddie Lu is a friend of Bela Lugosi, who resents being typecast after Dracula but regrets turning down Frankenstein after Boris Karloff became Hollywood’s go-to monster. Eddie understands what it means to be typecast. He cherishes Ibsen and Shakespeare but will never perform in film as anything other than a Japanese villain. “Studios strove to make ethnic characters more relatable to white America by casting them with actors who supposedly brought them one step closer to Anglo-Saxon: Chinese actors played Japanese characters, Jewish actors played Chinese characters, Catholic actors played Jewish characters, and Protestant actors played Catholic characters.”

In another scene that emphasizes America’s history of racism, the Army recruits a failed architect who works on set design for Mercury to build replicas of Berlin in Utah that can be destroyed in propaganda films. She supervises prison laborers who construct the buildings, including a young black man who insisted on being served at a lunch counter, setting events in motion that ended with the death of a German POW. The innocent teen is serving a life sentence despite playing no part in the German’s death. The architect was born in Germany and, while she is worried that the Army might hold her ancestry against her, she does not face the same kind of bigotry as the black teen.

While the novel tracks the lives of many characters, the story is primarily Maria’s, including the extended family she makes for herself. She is a victim of fascism in Italy and of nationalism in America, losing a father in Italy and a lover in the US while enduring a loss of liberty simply because she fled a country that went to war with America. Her moving story hits home when, in an epilogue, she returns to Italy to learn what she can about her father’s fate.

Mercury Pictures Presents offers a perfect blend of humor and drama. People are awful until a good one comes alone, making simple decency seem remarkable. Social commentary is poignant without becoming overbearing. The story evokes emotion without becoming saccharine. The plot takes the reader on entertaining detours without becoming lost. Dialog is intelligent and surprising. Historical research (cited in the acknowledgements) contributes to a detailed atmosphere, both in Hollywood and Italy. This is an award-worthy novel. I admired everything about it.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

40 by Alan Heathcock

Published by Farar, Straus and Giroux/MCD on August 2, 2022

A beginning and ending of moderate interest sandwich a dull middle that offers almost nothing of interest. But for the protagonist’s wings, 40 begins like a standard dystopian tale. Mazzy Goodwin views her job as protecting her little sister, but she’s awful at that job. In her regular Army gig, Mazzy is also protecting West Texas from the Novae Terra, a religious cult that became a movement that birthed an insurrection. The cult’s leader is Jo Sam, who might or might not be a space alien. The Novae Terra gives a boatload of cash and a lifetime income to its initiates, provided they wear a white-sleeved uniform and carry an assault rifle. The Novae Terra have created an elite military force known as the Pearl.

A shockingly incompetent government can’t seem to identify the source of Novae Terra’s wealth, but it sees the results. Novae Terra has acquired much of the country’s farmland and has poisoned the rest of it, giving itself control over the nation’s food supply. Novae Terra has promised to create a world that is free of suffering, but only initiates benefit from that pledge. Jo Sam knows that most people will sell their soul to avoid even a day of hunger. Novae Terra distributes food from rural churches while its drones bomb cities. The government seems powerless to do anything about it.

Jo Sam trades on the reality that weak-minded people will believe any stupid conspiracy theory if it appears on multiple websites and feeds into their underlying anger. Claims that the government is trying to starve American citizens to enslave and control them and that the president eats babies (sound familiar?) have contributed to anti-government sentiment.

Jo Sam appears to be a drunk who likes to sing American Pie, making him an unlikely leader, but perhaps he attracts a following by being an ordinary guy. Or perhaps his followers are love with their conspiracy theories and don’t care who leads them. Or perhaps the drunk is a front for the true Jo Sam.

Against this background, Mazzy’s home has been attacked. Her sister Ava Lynn has been taken by Nova Terra. An actor named Raja Garbos has defected from Novae Terra. Garbos offers to use his Nova Terra contacts to help Mazzy recover Ava Lynn. The story trudges on from there.

Most of the middle involves Mazzy’s attempt to recover Ava Lynn, which may or may not be part of a larger plan that Mazzy may or may not understand. Nova Terra promises to return Ava Lynn if she plays the role of Seraphine, the Angel of 40. The “40” refers to the Nation of 40, formerly New Los Angeles, a nation controlled by Jo Sam and Novae Terra.

Mazzy’s role in the novel is to fret about all the awful things she’s seen until she flies to a different location so she can fret some more. She is “haunted by what might have been.” What if she had studied harder or if her mother had money or if she’d watched out for her sister? All prompting me to ask, What if you stopped fretting and did something useful, or at least interesting? Most of the time, Mazzy is either showing off or hiding her wings.

Oh right, the wings. A half-baked explanation for the wings that tries to sound sciencey appears near the novel’s end, but it’s a crock. It’s better to view this as a fantasy with a winged protagonist whose magic wings represent angelic purity of heart. Or something.

Alan Heathcock’s prose strives to be poetic and while it often achieves that goal, the style is too often a distracting substitute for actual storytelling. It’s fine to aim for literary prose, but Heathcock tries too hard, sometimes delivering pretension rather than beauty. “The silo’s amoebic light ever shifting, the tree’s golden leaves winking, and the odd birds ceaselessly singing, I became disoriented, not just feeling that the place was manufactured, but that the same could be said of my childhood home and maybe even for me.” This sounds like a description of someone tripping on acid, but it’s just Mazzy laying on her couch doing nothing.

Mazzy spends a lot of time doing nothing, other than feeling sorry for herself or pontificating about grief or her crisis of faith or the unfairness of human existence. Heathcock balances Mazzy’s dystopian angst with Mazzy’s little sister’s uncanny wisdom and strength because stories like this always have a little kid who sounds like an Ivy League divinity professor. I didn’t believe a moment of this story (at least after the wings appear), nor  was I drawn sufficiently into the story to generate a willing suspension of disbelief.

NOT RECOMMENDED

Alias Emma by Ava Glass

Published by ‎ Bantam on August 2, 2022

Russian assassins have been killing former Russian scientists who were once affiliated with Elena Primolov, a Russian nuclear physicist who was an asset of MI6. Charles Ripley was once Elena’s handler and perhaps her lover. Ripley spirited Elena and her family out of Russia just before the KGB was going to swoop down upon her. Years later, Ripley has a senior position in the Secret Intelligence Service. When he learns that Russians who were once close to Elena are being targeted, Ripley moves Elena to a secure location. Just how secure it might be is open to question. Another Russian lodged in a safe house was just killed, leading Ripley to suspect that a Russian mole is working in the SIS.

Ripley is training a young agent whose code name is Emma Makepeace. He gives her a meaningless assignment to get her out of the way, then tasks her with persuading Elena’s son Michael to stay with his protected mother. Michael is a pediatric oncologist in London and wants nothing to do with cloak-and-dagger shenanigans until he changes his mind after the second time Emma saves his life.

Ed Masterson wants Ripley’s job. Does he undermine Ripley and Emma because he is a double agent or is he merely ambitious? Ripley’s future is unclear by novel’s end, as is the identity of the mole, assuming one exists (and in spy fiction, one always exists).

Most of Emma’s adventure involves an extended chase scene. To get Michael to safety, Emma must tamp down her growing lust for the doctor while navigating their way through London as they are being pursued by Russian assassins. The tour of London’s back alleys and underground waterway (to avoid the city’s network of cameras that the Russians have somehow hijacked) adds atmosphere to a story that is competent but unremarkable.

Emma is a bit of a lightweight as fictional spies go, likeable enough but not memorable. The reader doesn’t spend enough time with other characters to learn anything about them, apart from one-dimensional Michael, who is a stereotype of a perfect man. He loves kids and saves them from cancer. What could be better? How sad for Emma that her duty is to Queen and Country rather than her naughty bits.

While the ending wraps up the story of Russian assassins, it leaves enough questions unanswered to make clear that Alias Emma is the first in a series that will feature Emma’s adventures in espionage. Spy novel fans won’t put Alias Emma on top of their stack of 2022 spy novels, but it is worth reading as an introduction to a series that might gain more depth and intrigue as it progresses.

RECOMMENDED

Yesterday's Spy by Tom Bradby

Published by Atlantic Monthly Press on August 2, 2022

Yesterday’s Spy is set against the background of the 1953 coup in Iran that displaced Mossadegh and elevated the Shah to power. The coup was planned and assisted by the American and British governments. The British wanted to assure that British oil companies would continue to earn the lion’s share of revenues from Iranian oil. The CIA supported the coup because of its obsession with communism. Neither government considered the long-term consequences of backing the Shah. Western meddling is largely responsible for the Islamic Revolution of 1979.

Harry Tower is a British spy. Lacking a British public school pedigree, he knew he would always be regarded as an outsider by the SIS. Fortunately for Harry, Churchill noticed him and had his back. During World War II, Churchill decided to support Tito. With Churchill’s support, Harry and another SIS agent ran anti-communist operations in Yugoslavia, where Harry got to know KGB agent Oleg Vasilyev. One SIS operation involved British troops parachuting into the country. The operation went sideways because Russia learned of the plan before it began. The deaths of the paratroopers sit heavily on Tower’s conscience.

Harry’s son Sean is a journalist. Sean blames Harry for his mother’s suicide. Harry’s wife suffered from bouts of severe depression and, rather than being there when she cycled into a dark phase, Harry was off saving the world. Harry returned from an assignment and found Sean holding his mother’s body after cutting her from the rope she used to hang herself. Harry understandably blames himself but wishes he could do more for Sean, who wants nothing that Harry tries to give him.

Much of that background is developed through flashbacks. The novel begins in the planning stages of the coup. Harry learns that Sean has been kidnapped. He immediately heads to Tehran, where he meets Sean’s girlfriend, Shahnaz Salemi. Harry has had dealings with Shahnaz’s father. Shahnaz bonded with Sean in part because she and Sean both despised their fathers. Father-child relationships are at the heart of the novel.

The plot is typical of a decent spy thriller. Harry spends the novel chasing down leads (most of which suggest that Sean is dead or will be soon) and figuring out why Sean was kidnapped. Was it his reporting about the drug connection between the Iranian police and the French? Did he learn about the planned coup? Or was the kidnapping part of a plan to lure Harry back to Iran, a plan that involves a suspected mole in SIS? Harry connects with various spies (including Vasilyev), cops, criminals, members of the military, arms dealers, information brokers, and various players in Iranian government, gathering conflicting information as a noose seems to be tightening around Harry’s neck.

Yesterday’s Spy delivers the suspense that readers expect from a spy novel. The clock keeps ticking, both because there may be little time to save Sean if he still alive and because the fate of the Iranian government may change at any moment. Harry is involved in fistfights and shootouts, but his actions seem plausible. Harry is well trained but far from the super-heroic tough guy that is such a common thriller protagonist. It isn’t easy to warm up to Harry, in part because the background that shapes his characterization has made Harry insular and self-absorbed. Still, Tom Brady structured the novel to make it possible for the reader to appreciate the story without liking the protagonist.

As is typical of spy novels that incorporate a mole, the reader is asked to guess the mole’s identity. I guessed wrong, so Bradby scored a point for his surprising reveal. The ending is not only surprising, it is redemptive and satisfying.

RECOMMENDED

Eversion by Alastair Reynolds

First published in Great Britain in 2022; published by Orbit on August 2, 2022

During the early chapters of Eversion, I wondered whether Alastair Reynolds had departed from his career as a science fiction writer to tell a seafaring adventure story. By the midpoint, it becomes clear that the novel is not what it seems. By the last quarter, a surprising reveal brings science fiction to the forefront of the story. Kudos to Reynolds for his masterful misdirection.

The story in Eversion is told by Silas Coade. Silas has been hired as ship’s surgeon to serve on the Demeter. The ship is sailing near the coast of Norway, following a map to a structure that characters dub the Edifice. The Demeter is a sizable vessel, carrying a hundred crew members, although only few characters are significant to the story. The ship’s captain is Van Vught; the man who arranged and funded the expedition is Topolsky. Dupin is a scientist and Ramos is in charge of security. Countess Cossile is a snarky linguist/journalist who makes it her mission to annoy Silas and everyone else with her self-assured belief in her intellectual superiority. She is particularly critical of the science fiction potboiler that Silas is writing.

A character dies early in Eversion and reappears in a later chapter, no worse for the death. Other characters do not seem to notice. I thought perhaps I had lost my place in the novel and was rereading unremembered pages before the death, or that I was mistaking one character for another. But then a mast that toppled is back in its place and only one character remembers that it fell. Still later in the book, the Demeter has become a different kind of vessel and the location of the Edifice has changed. In each version of the story, the characters encounter a wrecked ship called the Europa and become angry with Topolsky for not revealing his knowledge of the vessel. Silas and Ramos eventually recall different parts of the stories that have come before, as if the memories were of dreams.

The novel’s title refers to turning a sphere inside out. Dupin is a bit obsessed with the idea of eversion. The title is apt, as the story turns itself inside out before it reaches a conclusion. As the reader grasps for hidden truths, it becomes apparent that the truth is known to Cossile, who insists that it is also known to Silas, if only he would face it. “The truth is a raw nerve” and Silas flinches and retreats whenever he touches it. But what is the truth that Silas refuses to accept? Perhaps he has been gripped by madness. Perhaps the truth will make him descend into madness, again and again. Reynolds plants clues to the truth here and there, bits of the story that don’t seem to matter until they do. The plot is both a journey toward truth and a reminder that it is difficult to accept discomforting truths about ourselves.

Reynolds builds a moral dilemma into the story, the old question of whether killing one person to save more than one other person is morally justified. Does the equation change if the killing can be accomplished with kindness? Does it change if the killer is a doctor who has sworn to do no harm? Some of the novel’s dramatic tension arises from the characters’ disagreement about how to answer that question.

The moral issue adds another layer of depth to a complex story of courage and sacrifice. Reynolds even adds an offbeat love story to the mix. Eversion is my mid-year favorite science fiction novel of 2022. I suspect it will still be my favorite at year’s end.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED