"Harlot's Ghost" is a major novel by a major, and unique American novelist, Norman Mailer. Originally published in 1992, it was a return to form for Mailer after many years in which he was better known for his non-fiction and his highly public boozing and brawling lifestyle. While it is worthy of being celebrated for many not inconsiderable virtues, it is also seriously flawed: overlong, plodding and inconclusive (the novel closes with the words "To Be Continued" but it never was.) It is probably best enjoyed by someone who shares some of the author's obsessions with the CIA, the Kennedy assasination and the ideals associated with male vigor that the generation that came of age during World War II adhered to prior to the sexual revolution of the 60s.
It is a fictionalized account of the CIA, focusing on the years between 1955 and 1963, culiminating in the assasination of President Kennedy. (As a point of reference, Robert deNiro's recent film "The Good Shephard" covers similar ground.) It's sweeping narrative encompasses a number of factual tales along the way, including the spying tunnel built by the CIA under East Berlin in the 50's and the book's centerpiece, the CIA's involvement in the Bay of Pigs fiasco in 1961, the CIA's bungled attempt at an invasion of Cuba to foment a counter-revolution against Castro. It is informed by the extensive airing of the CIA's penchant for "dirty tricks" that became public in the wake of the Watergate scandal.
Mailer's novelization covers this factual ground in a relatively entertaining fashion using a fictinal narrator named Herrick (Harry) Hubbard. He is himself a CIA operative and witness to many of these real-life events. Hubbard is a Company insider, to the manor born through both his father and his godfather (whose code name is Harlot of the title), both legendary OSS agents during WWII who are then present at the creation of the American spy agency built to contest the Soviet KGB at the outset of the Cold War. Harlot is modeled on the famous CIA superspy James Jesus Angleton, and Harry Hubbard doing his bidding is Harlot's ghost of the title.
There are a number of serious problems with the book which are perhaps accentuated by that tantalizing "To Be Continued." The narrative arc of Hubbard's education into both his chosen profession and the erotic mysteries of sex is episodic & inconclusive. Hubbard's memoir is awkwardly fashioned mainly from a clandestine correspondnce he carries on with Harlot's attractive young wife, Kittredge, who also happens to be employed by the CIA. The voluminous and unctuous letter-writing campaign is fatal to the book. The secret letters are explicit acts of betrayal and confession for both Harry and Kittredge. But instead of having an edge that sparkles, the letters fizzle and our interest in the authors wanes. The correspondence is downright boring in large patches, and elsewhere strains the credularity of the Reader -- who are these people? -- in many other passages. Neither Harry or Kittredge ever develop into characters with any spark of life. They are not believable. The Reader never musters much sympathy for these rather wooden, one-dimensional protagonists. Another problem is they are really on the edge of most of the action, never comprehending the bigger picture, murky as it is in this nether-world of spooks (real and imnagined) and double agents. Mailer labors mightily to make this creaky narrative apparatus work, but it doesn't quite.
Numerous real personages put in both cameo and extended appearances, among them E. Howard Hunt (later of Watergate fame), Allen Dulles, J Edgar Hoover, Robert Kennedy, Wild Bill Harvey (who unmasked the high ranking British double agent Kim Philby), and a juicy, fictionalized version of Judith Campbell Exner, the beautiful and sexy mistress of both JFK and mob kingpin Sam Giancana (by way of Frank Sinatra). The CIA's tragic-comic experiments with LSD, its collusion with organized crime to assasinate Castro, the extensive wire-tapping on US citizens performed by FBI under J Edgar Hoover are well-documented events that are woven into the plot. In Mailer hands, it is a rich brew, even if it all doesn't quite come together. The narrative gels in many sections as young Harry learns his tradecraft during a stint in Uruguay in the late '50s or makes a daring midnight raid on the coast of Cuba during the 1962 missile crisis that brought the US and the Soviet Union to the brink of nuclear war.
But the length of the book, its many sodden passages, and its lack of any sort of a coherent conclusion may cause you to wonder -- a 1000+ pages later -- whether it was worth the ride.
