A book review (Marc)

Triple by Ken Follett

Triple takes place during the cold war in the late sixties and is based on a true story. Israel has just gotten off (has just finished) the Six-Day war, when one of its double agents found out that Egypt is doing nuclear research, possibly to build an atomic bomb. Additionally, (not only were there rumors... but that france was going to cut off his support for Israel) there were rumors that Russia was going to support Egypt and finally France cut off its support. Israel definitely had its back to the wall. In order to get out of this (apparently) no-win situation, the aim (plan) was to build an (their) own nuclear bomb, before the Arabs finish theirs. For this reason the protagonist Nat Dickstein, working for the Israeli intelligence, was tasked to steal a sizable amount uranium without anyone noticing. (Constatly) Always followed by Yassif Hassan, an Egyptian intelligence officer, and David Rostov, working for the KGB and both want to derail his plan.

What drew me most into the novel are (was) the deftly handled relationships between the well-developed and multilayer characters. Ken Follett gave (gives) each of them its (their) own personality and brilliantly describes their point of view. While following this cat and mouse story, the acts of each individual seemed very clear to me. Further, I was gripped by Follett's writing style, which includes a rather vivid telling of the story, peppered with a lot of partly ironic jokes made by the characters. Finally, I was spellbound by the fact that the book made me think about the history of Middle East, since it's based on a true story.

The plot contains several completely different characters: The story is centered around the protagonist Nat Dickstein, who was a soldier in his former life and is now working for the Israeli Intelligence. He was given a daunting task of supplying his country with uranium, but where and how he'd get the material was completely up to him. Though Dickstein is clever and experienced enough to figure a plan and he has the aptitude to shake off his tails again and again.

Triple is a real page-turner, since it offers a muiltlayer story including very interesting characters. You will learn something about the Middle East conflict and the importance of nuclear weapons for the involved countries. It's definitely not a typical spy story with a lot of affairs and exaggerated events, like James Bond, but it tells a realistic as well as humorous and convincing story about an event that really took place. Absolutely worth reading it!