Furst pens another classic spy novel

    Col. Jean-Francois Mercier is a Frenchman from the old school. He is honorable and intelligent with a blend of cynicism and romance.
   Mercier is the fascinating main character in Alan Furst’s fine historical espionage novel, “The Spies of  Warsaw.” The novel solidifies Furst’s reputation as a spy novelist in the same league as John LeCarre, Graham Greene and Eric Ambler.
   Furst’s 10th spy novel captures the atmosphere of prewar Europe. Mercier is the military attache at  the French embassy in Warsaw in 1937 where he doubles as spy and diplomat. The Poles are fearful of the growing power of Nazi Germany, but still go about their business, while the complacent and incompetent French government is certain that its Maginot Line will withstand any attack.
   Mercier knows his superiors are idiots, but he continues to play his dangerous game. He tries to save one of  his agents, a German engineer at an arms factory, who panics when he believes Gestapo is on to him.  Mercier, who entrapped the agent into a life of espionage using a woman as bait, tries to instill the will to survive into the paranoid German.
    Furst immerses the reader into Mercier’s complex world. The Frenchman uses his wits and diplomatic skills to deal with a Russian married couple who attempt to pump him for information at an embassy party. The strongest scene takes place in a forest where Mercier secretly observes a German armored unit holding night maneuvers. The author conveys Mercier’s sense of dread, not only for his own safety, but also for the fate of the world he knows if the military might of Germany is unleashed.
   Despite the overwhelming stress of his double life, Mercier manages to have a romance with a League of Nations lawyer. After all he is French and knows what’s important in life.