10/18/2021
Debut novelist Mann’s colorful if drawn-out historical adventure, set in the last three years of the Third Reich, follows a reluctant (but not that reluctant) Nazi agent. Sonderführer Adrian de Groot, alias Johann Grotius, is charged with acting as “case officer” for the Irish revolutionary Proinnsias “Frank” Pike, currently being held prisoner in Spain. His mission is to groom the IRA fighter for life as a double agent ahead of a planned invasion of Ireland. Pike reawakens de Groot’s prewar literary aspirations, and the two become lovers before embarking on a daring mission to infiltrate a radio broadcast and sway it to Germany’s purposes. In a parallel story line, Pike is the Gaelic folk hero Finn McCool, a double agent and assassin at large “in the bowels of Teutonia,” cutting a murderous path through the SS, eventually setting his sights on Dr. Morell, Hitler’s personal physician. In this version, de Groot is Cú Chulainn, the “Torqued Man” of the title, a figure of redemption with “merchant’s blood but literature in his heart... a reluctant middleman for book-burners.” The narrative, though, is overlong and its length outstrips its considerable charm. Still, Mann proves adept at picking up on the emotional kernels at the heart of history. Agent: Susan Golomb, Writers House. (Jan.)
I loved The Torqued Man, its riotous irreverence, its coiled suspense. It’s a brilliant, surprising novel, Don Quixote by way of le Carré.” — Jess Walter, New York Times bestselling author of Beautiful Ruins and The Cold Millions
"Writing with intelligence, style, and wit, Peter Mann has created two unforgettable characters and braided them together in a thrilling World War II story unlike any other." — David Ebershoff, New York Times bestselling author of The 19th Wife and The Danish Girl
“Peter Mann’s The Torqued Man is a damn good read.” — Alan Furst
“Peter Mann, creator of 'The Quixote Syndrome,' a comic dedicated to 'history, literature, and the absurd,' brilliantly combines all three subjects in this debut novel about two men during World War II, one a German military intelligence officer and the other an Irish spy who fancies himself a modern-day Celtic legend. Each recounts the same events in his own manuscript, leaving the reader to deduce what’s real. Mann’s sometimes graphic, sometimes heartbreaking, always entertaining thriller draws parallels to similar forces pulling against each other in modern life.” — Washington Post
“‘Vexing’ doesn’t begin to describe the intricate maneuverings of the two narrators in Peter Mann’s quick-witted World War II caper. But ‘compelling’ certainly does.” — New York Times Book Review
“Highly entertaining. . . . The two stories contained within . . . fit together like the teeth of a zipper, one atop the other, until the whole thing is satisfyingly pulled into place.” — San Francisco Chronicle
“A rollicking spy novel full of Nabokovian tricks, The Torqued Man is wildly funny and tremendously sad. In its pages, Europe under the shadow of the Third Reich and RAF bombings comes alive again; this is a brilliant debut.” — Louisa Hall, author of Trinity
“Mann’s brisk and well-constructed plot is enhanced by equally impressive prose…A wily spy novel with a human touch.” — Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
“Peter Mann makes two (at first) seemingly outlandish characters and plotlines work together through the continuous control which he exerts over his tone. The result is a strange, sinisterly funny meditation on that greatest of all imponderables: the Second World War.” — Lawrence Osborne, author of The Forgiven and The Glass Kingdom
“[Mann’s] writing is cunning and effortless. As [his] two story streams eventually converge, satisfaction comes courtesy of sophistication delivered without pretense by a marvelous storyteller.” — East Bay Express
"This fiendishly clever, elegant debut novel . . . combines a clear-eyed vision of a not-so-distant period of history with canny spy-world touches and astute elements of farcical humor." — Boston Globe
"[A] distinctive, hard-to-categorize debut . . . This book is a wildly entertaining spy thriller based on a true story." — Minneapolis Star Tribune
"As the chapters alternate between the manuscripts, two irreconcilable portraits of Pike emerge, while de Groot's love for the Irishman gradually emboldens him." — New Yorker
"Mann proves adept at picking up on the emotional kernels at the heart of history." — Publishers Weekly
"The story is fascinating, and well-written characters add to the complexity." — Library Journal
I loved The Torqued Man, its riotous irreverence, its coiled suspense. It’s a brilliant, surprising novel, Don Quixote by way of le Carré.”
Peter Mann makes two (at first) seemingly outlandish characters and plotlines work together through the continuous control which he exerts over his tone. The result is a strange, sinisterly funny meditation on that greatest of all imponderables: the Second World War.”
A rollicking spy novel full of Nabokovian tricks, The Torqued Man is wildly funny and tremendously sad. In its pages, Europe under the shadow of the Third Reich and RAF bombings comes alive again; this is a brilliant debut.”
Peter Mann’s The Torqued Man is a damn good read.
"Writing with intelligence, style, and wit, Peter Mann has created two unforgettable characters and braided them together in a thrilling World War II story unlike any other."
★ 03/01/2022
In his debut novel, Mann takes listeners on a grand adventure in Germany during the last few years of the Third Reich. Moral ambiguity, intrigue, double crosses, and deception are ever present, as are humor, mythology, and numerous murders. The story progresses in alternating chapters of the journals of the "the Torqued Man," Adrian de Groot. The journals begin in the heady days of the Spanish civil war and ultimately are being read by an American OSS agent after World War II. The Torqued Man was an Abwehr agent and handler of Frank Pike, an IRA agent originally recruited by the Nazis from a Spanish prison to assist in their planned invasion of England. Each entry views the same subject from a very different point of view. Pike is charming, gregarious, and secretly plotting to kill Hitler's personal physician, while de Groot is cool and Teutonic. The story is fascinating, and well-written characters add to the complexity. The narration of John Lee is superb, especially his believable Irish and German accents. VERDICT A real treat for listeners; highly recommended.—Scott DiMarco
08/01/2021
What was the truth about German spy handler Adrian de Groot and his Irish agent, friend, and sometimes lover Frank Pike during World War II? With two very different manuscripts dug out of the rubble of 1945 Berlin, it's hard to tell. One shows de Groot wresting IRA fighter Pike from prison in Spain to facilitate a German invasion of Ireland, while another shows Pike assuming the mantle of Celtic hero Finn McCool and planning the assassination of bigwig Nazi doctors. An intriguing debut from Whiting Fellowship winner Mann.
John Lee's thoroughly entertaining performance is so deft that listeners may take for granted what he's pulling off: shifting between two distinct points of view and worlds while keeping all the main and secondary characters unique and recognizable. Mann's spy novel weaves two stories and two protagonists. In the time of the Third Reich, Adrien de Groot is a German government handler; Frank Pike is an Irish spy. They come to rely on each other, but their motivations for doing so are mysterious. Lee gives commanding portrayals of the erudite de Groot and the man-of-action Pike. In doing so, he consistently captures the German's cerebral wit and the Irishman's outlandish bravado. S.P.C. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine
John Lee's thoroughly entertaining performance is so deft that listeners may take for granted what he's pulling off: shifting between two distinct points of view and worlds while keeping all the main and secondary characters unique and recognizable. Mann's spy novel weaves two stories and two protagonists. In the time of the Third Reich, Adrien de Groot is a German government handler; Frank Pike is an Irish spy. They come to rely on each other, but their motivations for doing so are mysterious. Lee gives commanding portrayals of the erudite de Groot and the man-of-action Pike. In doing so, he consistently captures the German's cerebral wit and the Irishman's outlandish bravado. S.P.C. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine
★ 2021-10-13
An Irish double agent and his German handler form an unlikely bond in 1940s Berlin.
When ex–Irish resistance fighter Proinnsias “Frank” Pike is liberated from a Spanish prison in 1940 by German intelligence operative Adrian de Groot, aka Johann Grotius, the ill-matched duo are launched on a daring series of exploits inside Nazi Germany. Debut novelist Mann seamlessly intertwines two narratives—de Groot’s candid journal and a third-person account of Pike’s escapades entitled “Finn McCool in the Bowels of Teutonia” (his alter ego is a well-known hunter/warrior figure in Irish mythology)—to describe some of the same events from their wildly differing perspectives. De Groot, a philologist and translator and the titular torqued man (another sly nod to Irish myth), recruits Pike to engage in missions intended to turn Ireland’s ancient antipathy to England into full-fledged support for Hitler’s regime, but the Germans are a step behind the English, who intend to take advantage of Pike’s presence in the heart of the Reich’s war machine to thwart these schemes and serve their own ends. Once Pike, whose “man of action” bravado and “gregarious and libidinous personality” contrast sharply with de Groot’s intellectual diffidence, is transported to the heart of Berlin, he embarks on a devilishly clever “assassination-and-mayhem campaign” designed to decimate the upper ranks of the German medical profession, with the goal of eventually eliminating Hitler himself. More suited to scholarship than spycraft, de Groot finds that his attempts to bring order to the “perpetual misadventure that life with Pike would come to entail” are complicated by an intense personal affection for his charge. Mann’s brisk and well-constructed plot is enhanced by equally impressive prose that succeeds in making the inner lives of his principal characters as engaging as Pike’s often hair-raising (if occasionally ill-conceived) deeds.
A wily spy novel with a human touch.
