White didn’t look thrilled at the prospect, but he had also caught sight of Valera and could read between Kennedy’s lines.
‘Are you sure that’s wise?’ he asked.
‘Total secrecy appears to be a luxury we can no longer afford,’ Holland replied. ‘And neither is paranoia. We have to trust someone, and it may as well be our own.’
‘I’m sure the Americans would never dream of pointing one of their satellites at us,’ Knox said. ‘But it would be nice to get a little warning if they did.’
‘Quite,’ Holland responded.
‘I’ll arrange a meeting,’ White said. Then he took his leave, followed almost immediately by Knox.
The conversations continued out in the hallway, but Knox didn’t join in with them. Instead, he headed straight to his office.
He shut the door behind him, sat down, and briefly cast his eyes over the reports that had been left on his desk for him to review. He thought again about Bennett, about discovering her in his kitchen, and the vision of a whole planet living under total surveillance that had scared her so much. He’d humoured her to begin with, then he started to share her concerns. Now he had the uncomfortable feeling that he’d just witnessed them take a very large step towards becoming reality.
He wanted to know if Bennett felt more terrified now, or relieved that at least it was her own government bringing her darkest fears to life. He also wanted to know if Valera was pleased with what she’d helped unleash on the world. But those were questions he couldn’t ask either of them.
Knox got up, removed a bottle of ten-year-old Ardbeg single malt whisky and a crystal glass from the low teak cabinet that ran the length of his office, and poured himself a drink. Then he stood at his window as the whisky sat untouched on his desk, looked out over the roofs of the city, and wondered if someone high above was looking down on him.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
The Cold War science and technology in Red Corona may seem fantastical, but it’s all real. Or at least based in fact.
The sixties was an intense period of innovation in this arena, driven in equal parts by ambition and paranoia. For several years the Corona programme was the apex of global surveillance, complete with parachutes and giant hooks. And ever-more-sophisticated listening devices were constantly being created by intelligence agencies all over the world, though Pipistrelle and Atlas brings a few major developments in that sphere forward by a few years.
But it wasn’t just the West that was coming up with new ways to spy on people from the stars or through walls. For most of the sixties, the USSR led the space race. Russia even had their own version of Corona called Zenit (codenamed Kosmos), which was only decommissioned in 1994. The Soviet naukograd system of closed cities is also well-documented, and both Kupriyanovich’s mobile phone and the BIOS-3 sealed ecosystem were real.
There’s no proof of any connection between the Corona programme and the Telstar communications satellite. But, as they were developed so close to each other, and represented a step-change evolution of the same technology, it’s compelling to speculate that there might have been a link.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This is an incomplete list of everyone who has helped make this novel a reality.
First and foremost, my thanks go to Chris for being there through thick and thin, and keeping me going through both.
Also to Sian for letting me cannibalise the spare room, and all my friends who forgave me when I dropped off the face of the earth for months and reappeared talking about satellites and parachutes.
To Dan M for his unceasing support and flattery. To Master Ng for my fortune.
To my family for putting up with my obsession with spies and space for so long. And especially my mother, who said there weren’t that many typos in the manuscript, and my father, who said he’d ignore them.
To Gordon Wise for seeing something in this book, or me, or both, that other people might like. And to everyone else at Curtis Brown for their support in making a dream come true.
To Jenny Parrott, whose kind words and sleight of hand helped me get everything that was stuck in my head onto the page. And to the rest of the team at Point Blank and Oneworld for taking a hell of a chance on me.
PRAISE FOR RED CORONA
‘Relentless and sleek. This pitch-perfect debut – a gripping espionage thriller in the vein of Charles Cumming, Tom Rob Smith, and Mick Herron – signals the arrival of a remarkable talent.’
‘A thoroughly engaging spy thriller that had me gripped from start to finish and left me desperate for more!’
‘A clever and complex thriller with truly memorable characters. The 60s setting is brilliantly done.’
‘A thriller of true ambition and scope – with Red Corona, his debut novel, Tim Glister announces himself as a writer to watch.’
‘A gripping historical thriller, impeccably researched and skilfully told.’
‘An engrossing and original spy thriller. Glister writes with confidence and excitement. A star of the espionage genre is born.’
‘A fascinating chase through an extraordinary time in history. Tim Glister blends technical insight with a clever story that races along. I enjoyed the intriguing characters who are rushing to solve a mystery as superpowers teeter on the brink.’
‘A fascinating and gripping Cold War thriller that shines a light on the surveillance race that hid in the shadow of the space race.’
Copyright
A Point Blank Book
First published in Great Britain, Australia and the Republic of Ireland by Point Blank, an imprint of Oneworld Publications, 2020
This ebook published 2020
Copyright © Tim Glister 2020
The moral right of Tim Glister to be identified as the Author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs, and Patents Act 1988
All rights reserved
Copyright under Berne Convention
A CIP record for this title is available from the British Library
ISBN 978-1-78607-779-0 (hardback)
ISBN 978-1-78607-739-4 (ebook)
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Oneworld Publications
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