Rating: 5/5
Review:
A very good novel
I thought Conflicts of Interest was very good. I enjoyed Terry Stiastny's first novel, Acts
of Omission; this is even better.
Conflicts of Interest is a sort of political thriller. I say sort of, because it is unlike
conventional political thrillers. There
are no car chases, deeply sinister threats or Conspiracies Which Go Right To
the Top (thank heavens!); it's a thoroughly believable novel which is largely
about character and about how politics, international charity, high-level PR
and journalism interact. Here is a world
of networking, social gatherings with the Right People, words in the right ears
and a sense of entitlement and everything being within one's grasp – until
apparently small, unimportant blind eyes turned in the past begin to resurface.
Written in the third person we get narratives from two points of view: Lawrence Leith, a British
TV journalist with what sounds like PTSD who is now retired in Provence after a
near breakdown and divorce, and Martin Elliott, once Lawrence's producer and
now head of a very successful high-end PR and reputation management
consultancy, who also owns a house near Lawrence's in France and who moves in
very exalted political circles. The plot
moves slowly but grippingly as Lawrence
begins to rebuild and events begin to close in on Martin. It's hard to say more without giving away too
much, but all the main characters seemed extremely real to me and Stastny
paints a vivid, wholly plausible picture of the way in which corruption's stain
can spread to those around it and how loyalties can evaporate instantly when
self-interest intervenes.
I found this readable, gripping and thought-provoking. It has important things to say about the
world of politics and those associated with it and also about loyalty and
friendship. I was expecting to enjoy the
book but I was still surprised by how good I found it. I can recommend it very warmly.
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