What We Become

April 1, 2016
Prolific master Perez-Reverte (The Siege, 2014, etc.) returns with a novel of fate, love, and deception that spans four decades as two beautiful misfits struggle to make a real human connection despite the violent politics of the Spanish Civil War and then the Cold War. Max Costa grows up in the slums of Buenos Aires to become the consummate con man: suave, handsome, and quick-fingered. While working as a ballroom dancer on a luxury ocean liner in 1928, he encounters Mecha, sparking a short but passionate affair. But Mecha is married to a famous Spanish composer with eclectic sexual tastes, and when the composer insists that Max escort the couple into the Argentinian underworld so that he might find gritty inspiration to write a "perfect tango," the night that follows puts Max on the run. Ten years later, now a successful thief, Max is recruited as a spy by two Italian agents, and while infiltrating a high-society party, he once again runs into Mecha. Passion reignites, but once again Max must leave precipitously. Both these stories unfold in pieces, intercut with a third encounter between Max and Mecha in 1966 as Mecha's son competes against a Russian for a chance to play in the world chess championship. In typical Perez-Reverte fashion, the novel's strength is in its details and its lush descriptions of exotic places and luxurious parties that contrast with political violence. This novel is also driven by the deeply flawed humanity of its two main characters: their desire and their inability to trust anyone, even each other, despite their strong connection. The sense of regret that imbues the 1966 storyline elevates the novel to a meditation on the ravages inflicted on the body and spirit by time and history. Perez-Reverte summons the romantic spirit of an old black-and-white movie: impossibly glamorous, undeniably wistful.

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Starred review from May 1, 2016
Max is a thief and a bit of roueoh, but what a roue, the kind men envy and women can't resist. Born in the Buenos Aires slums in the early twentieth century, Max fought his way out of there and reinvented himself as an elegant Spaniard, employed on ocean liners as a tango dancer to entertain the ladies while their husbands drink brandy. Then he meets Mecha, sees her pearl necklace, and finds himself torn between business and pleasure: the taste of absinthe in his mouth was sweet like a promise of women and adventure. Max gets both, much more than he bargained for, really, but yet, not nearly enough. Perez-Reverte, who has written of women and adventure before, along with crime and betrayal, combines them all here in a hypnotic rhapsody of a novel that drinks freely from many genres: historical epic, Hitchcockian thriller, and, above all, grand love story, both heartbreaking and deliciously sexy. Max and Mecha only meet three timeson the ocean liner, where their life-consuming passion ignites; in 1937, in Nice, where it burns again (and where Max is in full Cary Grant To Catch a Thief mode); and, much later, in 1966, when the near-elderly couple are thrown together with more dangers to confront. Perez-Reverte masterfully, excruciatingly, jumps back and forth between the three encounters, playing the reader's emotions masterfully and creating as much tension through the love story as through the derring-do and the betrayals that stain both. An intoxicating entertainment, pulsing with life but, at the same time, with a kind of damp, hidden lament for all that was and is no more. (Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)

Starred review from March 15, 2016

Elegance and deceit are the watchwords of international award-winning, Madrid-based Perez-Reverte's (The Club Dumas) smart, absorbing tale of intrigue and skullduggery. In the early years of the 20th century, Max Costa ditches his identity and given name after he joins the Spanish Foreign Legion. He emerges some time later to become an accomplished ballroom dancer and plies his trade--he's also a thief, among other things--between Spain and Argentina. As an employee of the cruise ship Cap Polonio, he meets the beautiful Mecha Inzunza de Troeye and her composer husband. The composer inveigles Max into taking him and his wife to a dive in Buenos Aires where they can watch (and dance) authentic tango, as opposed to its tame European version. And there begins the affair between Max and Mecha. After years of separation and two husbands later for her, they meet by chance in Sorrento, where her son is competing in a chess match against a Soviet grand master. "Tango and Chess" would be a suitable alternate title here, for Perez-Reverte offers engagingly detailed information about these subjects. VERDICT Told through numerous flashbacks and sparkling with witty dialog ("I like the fact that there's no way I can trust you"), this elegantly translated thriller is enthusiastically recommended to sophisticated readers and those who wish to be. [See Prepub Alert, 12/7/15.]--Edward B. Cone, New York

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

January 1, 2016

Perez-Reverte, best known for his literary thrillers (and who should be best known for The Painter of Battles, one of the most brilliantly uncompromising war novels written in the last two or three decades), returns with the story of an enduring love between gorgeous, high-society Mecha and Max, a sleekly sophisticated thief. They first meet on a transatlantic cruise ship en route from Lisbon to Buenos Aires in 1928; then in 1937 Nice, when their rekindled romance is snuffed by an encounter with a Spanish spy; and finally in 1966 Sorrento.

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

March 15, 2016

Elegance and deceit are the watchwords of international award-winning, Madrid-based Perez-Reverte's (The Club Dumas) smart, absorbing tale of intrigue and skullduggery. In the early years of the 20th century, Max Costa ditches his identity and given name after he joins the Spanish Foreign Legion. He emerges some time later to become an accomplished ballroom dancer and plies his trade--he's also a thief, among other things--between Spain and Argentina. As an employee of the cruise ship Cap Polonio, he meets the beautiful Mecha Inzunza de Troeye and her composer husband. The composer inveigles Max into taking him and his wife to a dive in Buenos Aires where they can watch (and dance) authentic tango, as opposed to its tame European version. And there begins the affair between Max and Mecha. After years of separation and two husbands later for her, they meet by chance in Sorrento, where her son is competing in a chess match against a Soviet grand master. "Tango and Chess" would be a suitable alternate title here, for Perez-Reverte offers engagingly detailed information about these subjects. VERDICT Told through numerous flashbacks and sparkling with witty dialog ("I like the fact that there's no way I can trust you"), this elegantly translated thriller is enthusiastically recommended to sophisticated readers and those who wish to be. [See Prepub Alert, 12/7/15.]--Edward B. Cone, New York

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.