The Jazz Club Spy
In January 1920, Giddy Brodsky, age five, shelters in a frozen cow carcass as Cossacks raid the village of Stulchyn, Ukraine, raping her mother and killing her brother and sister. Nineteen years later, she is a cigarette girl at Sid’s Paradise nightclub in Midtown Manhattan. That’s where she meets and works with handsome and suave Carter Van der Zalm to foil an apparent anarchist plot. But all is not what it seems.
The Jazz Club Spy is the fourth historical novel by Rich, known for the bestselling Midwife of Venice trilogy, set in the 16th century. The novel at the outset engages with startling and vivid imagery about the sights and sounds of a vicious attack on peasants. The novel builds the New York background setting with details about a young immigrant woman living and working in the Depression era.
Plotting does not sing, however. Pacing follows an a + b = c formula (no complicated or layered le Carré twists and turns here), and some strains of thought and action are easy to recognize and anticipate. This book is fine for those who may want to hum a few bars afterward, but not for those interested in a jam session heavy on scat and riffs.
