‘Deception’ by Alan Parks.

Published by Baskerville,
2 July 2026.
ISBN: 978-1-39981971-8 (HB)

It is December 1941 and Joseph Gunner, a former front-line soldier, is sitting in the Plaza Hotel near Central Park, smartly dressed and watching Joe Kennedy Jr (whose father, the powerful Senator Joe Kennedy Snr, is grooming him to be a future President of the United States) sharing a bottle of champagne with a young woman.  Gunner is in the States, officially as a member of the British Overseas Council, but actually as a member of the British Secret Service, there to try to persuade the USA to enter the Second World War.  Gunner’s job is to encourage pro-war sentiment, using planted news stories, radio broadcasts and blackmail, and generally disrupting the anti-war groups, of which Senator Kennedy is a vociferous supporter.  So when, later that evening, the younger Kennedy is photographed in a compromising situation with the young woman, this is useful evidence for blackmail. 

However, Alice, the woman involved in the ‘honeytrap’, is murdered and Gunner realises that the entrapment plan had been betrayed, so he tries to find out what is going on.  In so doing he becomes involved with Nazis, the New York mobs and the NYPD and, inevitably, there are more deaths.  Gunner starts to uncover a complex conspiracy, one that exceeds anything that he could have imagined.  The anti-war forces have the money, the resources and the manpower to pull some amazing stunts – including painting a huge Nazi swastika on an American ship in harbour for repairs, a tremendous coup if a photograph should ever get out. 

The plot maintains the tension throughout, helped by the well-described atmosphere of the time.  The characters are interesting, with individual allegiances changing without warning.  Gunner’s wartime injuries impinge on his ability to keep going and his doubts about his colleagues (he does not trust his boss, Nickerson) add to his problems and the general stress.  The sections of the book are divided into the week or so before Pearl Harbour, so the final outcome is not a surprise for the reader. 

This is the second in the series and works very well as a stand-alone.  The next book promises to be as gripping.
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Reviewer: Jo Hesslewood
Other books by this author:  in the Joseph Gunner series:  Gunner; in the Harry McCoy Thrillers:  Bloody January, February’s Son, Bobby March Will Live Forever, The April Dead, May God Forgive, To Die in June

Alan Parks has worked in the music industry for over twenty years. His debut novel Bloody January was one of the top crime debuts of 2018 and was shortlisted for the prestigious international crime prize the Grand Prix de Littérature Policière. He lives and works in Glasgow. 

Jo Hesslewood.  Crime fiction has been my favourite reading material since as a teenager I first spotted Agatha Christie on the library bookshelves.  For twenty-five years the commute to and from London provided plenty of reading time.  I am fortunate to live in Cambridge, where my local crime fiction book club, Crimecrackers, meets at Heffers Bookshop .  I enjoy attending crime fiction events and currently organise events for the Margery Allingham Society.