Blackford Oakes

Blackford Oakes is Yale's answer to James Bond. In this Cold War thriller, Oakes is sent abroad to penetrate England's royal circle and save the new Queen, after the CIA traces the leak of vital military secrets directly to the Queen's chambers.

When a shadowy Russian mole threatens to undermine the free world's defenses by infiltrating President Eisenhower's National Security Counsel, CIA super-secret agent Blackford Oakes is called in to unmask the imposter. Then, Oakes turns the tables on the Communists by piloting a U-2 spy plane on a Gary Powers-style one-way mission behind the Iron Curtain. Sentenced to death and trapped in the depths of the Lubyanka prison, Oakes may have turned his last trick. Or has he?

The year is 1961, the setting Havana. CIA super-secret agent Blackford Oakes has been sent there on a mission, only to find himself in the eye of an international political hurricane. President Kennedy has selected Oakes to meet with Che Guevara inside Castro's Cuba as part of his Operation Alligator, a daring plan to bring about an era of détente in East-West relations. The communists, however, have another agenda in mind: a double-cross with terrifying consequences. Soon, Oakes is trapped in Cuba, and the heat is on. Warming the climate greatly is the sultry beauty Catalina. The weather forecast: betrayal, power politics, and sudden death.

As Anatole Broyard of the New York Times has so aptly said, "If le Carré is the Henry James of suspense fiction, Buckley, if he chose, might be the Waugh." Bill Buckley has created a handsome American hero, Blackford Oakes, who happens to be an irreverent Yale-and-CIA-trained superspy. The year is 1954. Stalin has died in Moscow, and a deadly earnest power play nears its conclusion. Meanwhile, British and American commandos on a mission to liberate a Soviet satellite country have met a disastrous end. Jinxed. The communications system between English and American intelligence has been penetrated. Jinxed. There is a spook in their midst. High Jinx-higher still when the risk becomes one which Blacky alone must take.

Blackford Oakes launches a wild attempt to kill Castro on behalf of the CIA. Ever since the botched invasion at the Bay of Pigs, Fidel Castro has run amok. He has executed thousands of his enemies, driven his countrymen to emigrate, and done everything possible to run Cuba into the ground-all in a deliberate attempt to humiliate the White House. At least, that's how the situation looks from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, where hatred of Castro has grown into an obsession. Under orders from John and Bobby Kennedy, the CIA will do anything necessary to kill Castro-no matter how ridiculous. Even-tempered CIA agent Blackford Oakes is dismayed at the agency's wild schemes, which include everything from poisoned wet suits to Mafia hit men. But the evil of Castro's regime is not a joke, and Oakes won't be laughing when he tries to knock the dictator off his throne.

Over twenty years ago, William F. Buckley Jr. launched the dashing character of Blackford Oakes like a missile over the literary landscape. This newly minted CIA agent, brainy, bold, and complex, began his career by saving the queen of England and quickly took his place in the pantheon of master spies drawn up by Somerset Maugham, Graham Greene, and John le Carré. Against the backdrop of Cold War intrigue, in this his eleventh outing, Oakes crosses swords with Kim Philby, perhaps the highest-ranking in the parade of defectors to the Soviet Union. Oakes is now himself a master spy, this time working outside the ambit of the director and around agency rules. His romance with an able and worldly Soviet doctor is consolation for the death of his beloved Sally. But after his return to Washington, he receives dismaying news. It is inevitable that the great Soviet spy and the renowned American agent will meet again, this time with deadly consequences.