A Lily of the Field

by JohnLawton (Author)

• New

  Paperback
  2011

  $20.14

  Spanning the tumultuous years 1934 to 1948, John Lawton's A Lily of the Field is a brilliant historical thriller from a master of the form. The book follows two characters--M ret Voytek, a talented young cellist living in Vienna at the novel's start, and Dr. Karel Szabo, a Hungarian physicist interned in a camp on the Isle of Man. In his seventh Inspector Troy novel, Lawton moves seamlessly from Vienna and Auschwitz to the deserts of New Mexico and the rubble-strewn streets of postwar London, following the fascinating parallels of the physicist Szabo and musician Voytek as fate takes each far from home and across the untraditional battlefields of a destructive war to an unexpected intersection at the novel's close. The result, A Lily of the Field, is Lawton's best book yet, an historically accurate and remarkably written novel that explores the diaspora or two Europeans from the rise of Hitler to the post-atomic age.
  

• Used

  Hardcover
  2011

  $3.32

  'Observe in what an original world we are now living: how many men can you find in Europe who have never killed; or whom somebody does not wish to kill?' Vienna, 1934. Ten-year-old cello prodigy Meret Voytek becomes a pupil of concert pianist Viktor Rosen, a Jew in exile from Germany. The Isle of Man, 1940. An interned Hungarian physicist is recruited for the Manhattan Project in Los Alomos, building the atom bomb for the Americans. Auschwitz, 1944. Meret is imprisoned but is saved from certain death to play the cello in the camp orchestra. She is playing for her life. London, 1948. Viktor Rosen wants to relinquish his Communist Party membership after thirty years. His comrade and friend reminds him that he committed for life...These seemingly unconnected strands all collide forcefully with a brazen murder on a London Underground platform, revealing an intricate web of secrecy and deception. The ensuing events have personal significance for Scotland Yard Detective Frederick Troy. He finds himself pursuing a case with deadly and far-reaching consequences that ultimately threaten the balance of power in Europe. Moving seamlessly from Vienna and Auschwitz to the deserts of New Mexico and the rubble-strewn streets of London, A Lily of the Field is a fast-paced, thrilling addition for fans of the series and a captivating introduction for new readers of Lawton's work.