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Carter's new suspense novel presents unusual challenges for narrator Bahni Turpin, and she rises to them expertly. The setup: A patrician African-American college girl is chosen to act as a conduit for secret negotiations between JFK and Khrushchev during the terrifying public standoff of the Cuban missile crisis. Sound far-fetched? Oh, get over it. Carter makes it plausible; Margo Jensen, though young, is quite a personage and what a great cover story: yet another pretty young thing dallying with JFK. Turpin brings it crackling to life, speaking in those still familiar 1960s voices as JFK, RFK, McGeorge Bundy, Curtis LeMay, and myriad other hawks and doves, spies, and jingoists as both sides struggle to avert or precipitate nuclear war. Delicious. B.G. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine

June 30, 2014
In the prologue of Carter’s intriguing what-if thriller, Margo Jensen, a bright 19-year-old Cornell student, meets privately in Washington, D.C., with President Kennedy, who is trying to navigate the Cuban Missile Crisis without triggering nuclear war. Earlier that fall, Margo became involved in a covert intelligence operation through a brilliant Cornell professor of hers, Lorenz Niemeyer, who’s an expert on Conflict Theory. Margo learns that a Russian chess champion, Vasily Smyslov, has alerted the U.S. to a surprise Soviet move in Cuba. The only way to get more details from Smyslov is to send an American counterpart, Bobby Fischer, to Russia to sound him out, and Fischer will only go if Margo, whom he considers to be a good-luck charm, accompanies him. Carter (The Impeachment of Abraham Lincoln) makes this audacious premise convincing and manages to build suspense around a historical event with a known outcome. Author tour.