War thriller genre gains a strong voice

One of the pleasures of good crime fiction is its ability to transport us beyond the familiar and into the mean streets of a different time and place. The war thriller, a subgenre, has long depended on two staples, World War II and the Cold War, to give readers a glimpse into environments impossible for most of us to experience firsthand. But World War II has a “been there, done that” quality, while the collapse of the Soviet Union posed a problem for writers who relied on spy craft, or what former CIA Deputy Director James Angleton called “a wilderness of mirrors,” to fuel their plots. Yet such writers as Martin Cruz Smith, Joseph Kanon and Robert Harris have found ways to tell stories from a fresh perspective or with a twist that proves irresistible.

Add to this list Dan Fesperman, a reporter for the Baltimore Sun, which is owned by the Tribune Co., as is the Los Angeles Times. His first novel, 1999’s “Lie in the Dark,” introduced Vlado Petric, a homicide investigator in war-torn Sarajevo. Vlado’s investigation of the murder of a high-ranking police officer garnered the novel high praise and Britain’s John Creasy Memorial Dagger Award for best debut novel. Yet by the end of “Lie in the Dark,” Vlado was hiding in a crate on a cargo plane, bound for Frankfurt and an uncertain future. The sequel, “The Small Boat of Great Sorrows,” interweaves his life after his escape with the secret history resulting in his father’s repatriation to Yugoslavia after World War II. As the novel opens, we find him reunited in Berlin with his wife and daughter. As happy as his home life is, Vlado’s work at a construction site is menial, covering the former homicide detective’s boots with “the richest sediment of twentieth-century misery the world had to offer.” The site also yields relics of war, including live American bombs and a bunker used to house Nazi chauffeurs. Unearthing the past becomes the novel’s central metaphor when Calvin Pine, an American investigator for the International War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague, appears at Vlado’s apartment with a proposition: If Vlado helps the tribunal capture Pero Matek, a World War II criminal who committed atrocities at the infamous death camps in Jasenovac, he’ll be allowed to return to his homeland and resume his career. Once captured, Matek will be traded for Serbian Gen. Marko Andric, wanted by the tribunal for more recent atrocities at Srebrenica. Because of Vlado’s background, “local expertise” and honesty, Pine and his superiors deem him perfect for the job. Despite misgivings, Vlado feels the pull of the assignment and anticipates “the buzz of putting together an investigation, peeling away the wrappings until you found the prize at the center or ... nothing at all.”

Yet Pine and his superiors harbor a secret to use against Vlado -- an emotional bombshell that will ensure his loyalty. And Vlado is hiding something from his new bosses: his complicity in the murder of an aide to Andric also sought by the tribunal. The intersection of these secrets and their personal and political reverberations constitute one of the novel’s joys; another is Fesperman’s take on the machinations of Vlado’s colleagues, including (besides Pine), a female spy-chaser, a Bronx-born field operative and a pair of suave yet sinister diplomats.

Vlado’s return to Sarajevo and explosive encounter with Matek enable him to find closure with the people he met in the frantic days of the investigation featured in the first book. These scenes are skillfully executed so new readers won’t feel left out of the action. Even more skillfully rendered is the story of Vlado’s father and his involvement in World War II and tie to Matek, a tale that takes us from Bosnia to Italy, blends fiction with Cold War fact and includes references to Croatia’s pro-Nazi Ustasha and the complicity of Catholic clergy in helping war criminals escape prosecution. Fesperman’s credentials as a reporter covering the war in the former Yugoslavia serve him well as he leads us through 50 years of politics, ethnic hatred and war, while his skill as an observer of familial ties and human nature marks “The Small Boat of Great Sorrows” as another installment of what should set a new standard for war-based thrillers.