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Winthrop, Caroline

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0312037295 ISBN 13: 9780312037291

Publisher: St Martins Pr, 1990

Synopsis

The world of diplomacy and international intrigue is revealed in this novel about Judith Marlow, a diplomat's wife and the daughter of a notorious defector to the Soviets, and Aleksandr Dmitrov, the Russian officer she loves

About this title

From Publishers Weekly

This overhyped brew of intrigue and betrayal on the diplomatic circuit features a cast of characters that rival one another in shrill, selfish bitchery and a plot that packs no punch until midway through the novel. It's no wonder that the author, an established writer of women's fiction, chose to publish under a pseudonym. The death of loved ones sends Judith Marlowe off the rails. Her weak, besotted stepbrother Kenny, a minor diplomat, fishes her out of the bottle, marries her and sweeps her off to Poland. Bored, she launches an affair with Dmitrov, a KGB man whose task is to persuade her to visit her father, Phillip, a homosexual traitor who defected to Moscow years ago to the humiliation of his controlling, formidably perfect wife, who is now married to the secretary of state. Phillip has a secret that sends everyone scrambling, but a handful of vivid action scenes and well-sketched glimpses of Russian life don't make up for an overwrought style and stilted dialogue, or for repeated rapes apparently intended to pass as passion. 100,000 first printing; $100,000 ad/promo.
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

"Caroline Winthrop" is a pseudonym for an established romance writer who's trying her hand at spy novels, according to the publisher. The result is a cross between Jeffrey Archer and Mary Higgins Clark--but Clark's heroines are more admirable than these hard-nosed characters. Judith Marlowe, the foul-mouthed daughter of a U.S. diplomat who had defected to the Soviet Union during the Cold War, visits Moscow in 1982 to reunite with her father and find out where he's hidden his memoir. He dies, leaving only a cryptic clue to its whereabouts. The cliches continue for some 350 pages, from Moscow to Warsaw to London and Zambia--as Marlowe falls in love with a KGB agent and helps his family emigrate to Israel. Though surprises keep coming, the ending is obvious. Readers looking for light, intelligent intrigue should skip and try Kay Nolte Smith's novels.
- Joyce Smothers, Monmouth Cty. Lib., Manalapan, N.J.
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: St Martins Pr
• Publication date: 1990
• ISBN 10: 0312037295
• ISBN 13: 9780312037291
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 356