The Ghost by Robert Harris

"The moment I heard how McAra died, I should have walked away. I can see that now."

Thus begins a wonderful, paranoid political thriller by Robert Harris, narrated by a cynical, mercenary professional ghost writer, whose name we never learn. The ghost is between assignments creating saleable memories for burned out rock stars and minor celebrities, when his agent calls him up and offers him a high-paying assignment finishing the memoirs of the ex British Prime Minister, Adam Lang. Lang's career ended in tatters when he sided with America in the unpopular war on terror. His tell-all book purports to reveal all the potentially explosive background to the ant-terrorist campaign, but remains unfinished, with the publisher's deadline approaching, following the mysterious death of the PM's first ghost writer McAra. Lang is holed up in a remote estate in the bleakest of wintry landscapes on Martha's Vineyard, together with a small staff of personal assistant, secretaries and bodyguards. He is accompanied by his wife, who wants to go home but dares not leave him because she says he is not acting like himself. The ghost writer is an interloper in a group all trying to protect the PM from something, but who knows what? He is tolerated only because he has a job to get done. He prides himself on his special technique of interviewing that quickly enables him to get to know his subject. He can lead his subject into telling a story and creating memory which perhaps was never there before; but once told the story gains its own veracity. Despite his expertise, the ghost finds he cannot get to know the man behind the surface charm, and that he cannot even construct any "memories" that he feels ring true. Obviously, the tortured ex-PM has some very dark secrets that various unseen powers are doing their best to hush up - are even willing to kill for. Following various clues, including a series of photographs found in his predecessor's closet, the ghost tries to find out just what is going on. He himself may be in danger from forces he does not understand and he makes several wrong moves and trusts the wrong people. Right from the beginning the reader is swept in and keeps going willy nilly through every twist and turn. The narrator's voice is so compelling - he is the consummate story-teller.

The reader suspects that Adam Lang and his wife are modeled very closely on Tony and Cherie Blair. Blair's surface charm, boyish energy, and bonhommie are all there, as is Cherie's storied ruthlessness and her love of the political circus. When you read that Robert Harris is a former friend of the ex-PM, you can feel fairly certain that the similarities are not accidental. The book contains a barely disguised attack on Blair's policies and collusion with the US on the Middle east. The political background is fascinating. USA Today said that that Harris has produced "one of the most politically informed novels of the year."