Sebastian Faulks - On Green Dolphin Street

Reviewed by Malcolm Martland on 19th Feb '09.

Set among the workings of the British diplomatic service in 1959/60, at the time of the forthcoming Kennedy/Nixon election and in the heart of the cold war. Mary van Der Linden and her alcoholic husband, Charlie who works at the British Embassy in Washington – although he is involved with some secret ops too – as a spy! They seem to have it all: two lovely children, family happiness and a continuing round of parties to which is invited Frank Renzo, a seasoned NY based journalist on the point of covering the Kennedy side of the election. The story moves between Washington, New York and London, where Mary's parents live and in a flashback to French Indo China’s war with the Chinese and where Frank Renzo and Charlie first meet at the frontline – Frank covering the story and Charlie just following his curiosity – going without any diplomatic approval – masquerading as a journalist.

When the Lindens’ children are sent back to public school in the UK Mary with time on her hands spends more and more time with Frank who shows her the sites of New York – where in a bar they sit listening to a Miles Davis record – On Green Dolphin Street – great tune that – anyway the inevitable happens and the good wife drifts into an affair that becomes intense and serious.

But Mary’s mother is diagnosed with terminal cancer and so she makes several visits back home – meantime husband Charles is sent to USSR on a secret mission – but he has a mental breakdown and Mary is sent to bring him home. The bleak descriptions of a wintry Moscow under the communist regime are chilling – with Charlie’s diplomatic career in ruins Mary goes back to the US to arrange for their removal back to the UK – and meets up with Frank for the last time – there is one of those Romeo and Juliet moments where she decides at the airport to go back and live with Frank – and Frank decides to drive to the airport to declare his love – but when Mary phones Frank’s flat there is no answer – she thinks he has gone out womanising when he actually is driving to meet her – and Frank gets held up in traffic and misses the scheduled flight time – not knowing it has been delayed for 3 hours – so they never meet and he sadly returns to his flat and Mary flies home to look after her broken husband!

So what did I think of the writing – Sebastian Faulks recently wrote the latest James Bond novel ”Devil May Care” in the style of Ian Fleming but with the political intrigue and cold war background of On Green Dolphin Street I thought the writing was much more like John Le Carre – except the sex was better!