Code to Zero

Follett, Ken

ISBN 10: 0525945636 / ISBN 13: 9780525945635

Published by Dutton, New York, 2000

About this Item

First printing, December 2000, stated; full number line. Signed by the author on a tipped-in page after the front endpaper: "Ken Follett." The book is square and unmarked; corners sharp, spine ends bumped; faint foxing to the page edges. The dust jacket is price-clipped; a "Signed Copy" sticker on the front panel; edgewear at spine ends and corners; Brodart protected.

Seller Inventory # 002542

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Code to Zero
• Publisher: Dutton, New York
• Publication Date: 2000
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0525945636
• ISBN 13: 9780525945635
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Condition: Very Good +
• Dust Jacket Condition: Very Good
• Signed: Signed by Author(s)

About this title

Synopsis

Waking up in a railway station in 1958 with total amnesia, Luke Lucas begins to relearn his identity and realizes that his fate, as well as those of his wife, his best friend, and a woman he once loved, are connected to America's Explorer I space rocket.

Review

A man wakes up in ragged clothes in a back-alley with a headache, no memory and an equally shabby companion who assures him that this is an everyday occurrence. What distinguishes Luke, hero of Ken Follett's effective new thriller Code to Zero, is that he realises so very rapidly that the absence of any desire for alcohol means that he is being lied to. Smart and resourceful, but no superman, Luke's personal memories are gone, but his skills are still there--skills he realises he learned in WW2. Follett's sense of the conflicts and loyalties of the late Eisenhower 50s, with Sputnik in the sky and its American equivalent about to launch, is spot on; he is excellent on the game of shadows played by the early CIA men like Luke's old friend turned enemy Anthony, and the reasons why some people retained treasonable allegiance to Stalinism for so long. His management of shifts of time and viewpoint is slick and professional, but he also remembers what all this is for; the back story of Anthony, Luke, Luke's wife Elspeth and Billy, the woman whom Luke once loved and who holds the key to his mind, is intensely credible and moving. --Roz Kaveney