Timebomb: A Thriller
With the collapse of the USSR, a KGB major with 32 years’ service is unceremoniously laid off. Humiliation quickly becomes anger, and before he leaves, he steals a suitcase nuke and buries it in his yard. Years later, destitute, he and a fellow former KGB officer embark on a trip across Russia to deliver the weapon to a buyer. In London, a famously rude and abrasive Secret Intelligence Service officer connects obscure signals and divines what is about to happen. He also takes control of an undercover London cop who is working as a bodyguard for an expat Russian money launderer, a middleman in the deal. Both the cop and the money launderer are emotionally teetering due to the pressure they’re under, and any of these stressed-out players could make or break the transfer of the devastating bomb. Seymour, who is classed with espionage luminaries like Ambler and le Carré, has crafted a convoluted plot and a host of complex and exquisitely tormented characters, but it’s his focus on human frailty that makes Timebomb a winner. --Thomas Gaughan