Night Soldiers
by Alan Furst
In Bulgaria in 1934, nineteen-year-old Khristo Stoianev sees his brother kicked to death by a gang of strutting thugs. Realizing the growing menace of fascism, he takes a risk on the promise of communism and flees to Moscow, where he is trained as an agent of the NKVD, precursor of the KGB. His first mission is to Catalonia, where he is soon caught up in the bloody horrors of the Spanish Civil War. Then he learns that he is to become the victim of one of Stalin's purges and is forced to flee once again, this time to Paris. He is a hunted man and before his silent war is over, every rule will be broken...and all loyalties discarded. "NIGHT SOLDIERS has everything the best thrillers offer - excitement, intrigue, romance - plus grown-up writing, characters that matter, and a crisp, carefully researched portrait of the period in which our own postwar world was shaped." (USA Today)