Rating: 
Summary: not just a spy thriller
Review: SECRET FATHER is really two novels in one. First is an espionage thriller set in early 1960s Berlin, just before the Berlin Wall went up. Also, and more importantly, SECRET FATHER is a moving meditation on fathers and sons, and the things that make meaningful communication between them difficult.
The story concerns three teenagers:Michael Montgomery, Kit, and Ulrich (a German). They journey to East Berlin to see a May Day parade, flush with youthful energy. Michael and his father, an American banker, split narrative duties. Carroll cuts between the kids (betrayed and arrested) and Mr. Montgomery's alliance with Ulrich's mother to try to win their sons' freedom. Complicating matters are the fact that Ulrich's mother is now married to an American spy and that Ulrich now possesses a mysterious film cannister everyone seems to want.
The idea of fathers and sons knowing each other recurs throughout. The identity of Ulrich's real father is important, as is Michael's strained relationship with Mr. Montgomery. In a moving coda set just after the Wall falls in the '80s, Ulrich makes sure HIS son will know his father, even if he may not be around. Highly recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: A Good Effort
Review: Secret Father, James Carroll's newest novel, provides challenges to its readers. Most of the characters are not very likeable; others are remote - existing only in the memories of other characters; the plot is slower than those of the thrillers it resembles (it is not a thriller, at least in the technical sense). It is nonethless an engaging read and a welcome return to fiction by Mr. Carroll.Carroll's novels usually focus on unusual and talented people caught up in significant 20th century events. In his best novels, such as Mortal Friends, the characters are so rich that readers can't wait to find out how the characters end their stories. The plots zoom, with time passing quickly for both the characters and the readers. Lack of attention for a page can result in losing command of time, place, and machination. There is usually a full measure of sadness, often related to a lost or poisoned love. Secret Father revisits these usual elements, but with a different and less satisfying rhythm. Almost the entire book takes place over a three day span. Even with flashbacks and forwards, the epic scale common to most of Carroll's work is absent. Several fascinating backstories are truncated. Still, the sense of place and presence - 1961 Berlin and the post WWII blame and spy games - are up with Carroll's best. He also captures the dynamics of American military and business people. Reading Secret Father is like listening to a new album by a favorite jazz artist who is trying to do things a little differently. Here they are intimacy and focus on a very few days in several people's lives rather than a big broadstroke about significant issues. He could probably have written another "big book" about the period, and it might have been more fun to read, this book was his real love right now rather than our fantasy love, and Secret Father will tell you what that means. It's better than a "greatest hits" album because it's new and different, but you can still listen carefully for familiar chord changes and smile.
Rating:
Summary: Fathers, sons, and the iron curtain between them.
Review: Two families, two sons, and the devastating complications that engulf their lives during one weekend in April, 1961, provide a unique perspective on international gamesmanship in Berlin during the Cold War. These are tense times, border incidents are frequent, and the Berlin Wall is only days away from construction. At age seventeen, Michael Montgomery and Rick Healy are less concerned with the complications of the Cold War than they are with their rebellions against their fathers. Both are "trying on" new political ideas--in Rick's case, the idealistic goals of socialism and the philosophy of Marcuse. In alternating sections, Paul Montgomery, the father, and Michael Montgomery, the son, each reveal their thoughts and hopes for the future, and as the story unfolds, Carroll creates two entirely separate worlds, each fully drawn and presented as truth. The reader, moving back and forth between the generations, has the advantage both of hindsight regarding the Berlin crisis and insight into all the characters, and the story comes alive in the best narrative tradition. When Michael, Rick, and their friend Katharine Carson decide to skip school and go to East Berlin for the May Day parade and weekend festivities, Rick takes his stepfather's duffle bag, which, unbeknownst to him, contains some important film. The ensuing turmoil, which traps them in the eastern sector, involves both families as they try to avoid a potential international cataclysm. Through his focus on families affected by the Cold War, Carroll achieves more universality than one usually expects of the thriller genre. The emotional context he creates for the international intrigue leads the reader to identify with both the adults and the young people and to observe the "wall" existing between them. The title, suggesting a "secret father" lurking in the background, tantalizes the reader with infinite possibilities and plot complications throughout the novel, but exactly how this person affects the conclusion may come as a surprise. Though the book is sometimes a bit melodramatic, it is a thoughtful thriller, full of betrayals, threats, murder, and international skullduggery, and it brings the traditional Cold War espionage story to new life. Mary Whipple
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