by RobertTownsend | Dec 16, 2014 | Deception
Deception in Moscow, 1961 The ‘middle morass’ of The Executioner’s Son, that miserable time when, between the sparkling first scenes and a dramatic conclusion, you sit in that writing swamp struggling to “The End.” A 1900 Russian short...
by RobertTownsend | Nov 12, 2013 | Book Reviews, Publishing
While traveling these last two weeks via Istanbul, Venice and Trieste to Rovinj, Croatia I have been rereading Robert Olen Butler’s Christopher Marlowe Cobb novel, Hot Country and its follow-on, The Star of Istanbul. I think Hot Country is as good as any novel...
by RobertTownsend | Oct 4, 2011 | Deception
I add two caveats before I go on. Though I address the principals of denial and deception––deception, denial, deceit and misdirection––successively, linearity in deception, deception analysis and counter-deception should be, but most often are not, thought of as...
by RobertTownsend | Sep 8, 2011 | Deception, Soviet Union
You are traversing a large and dark room. Dim bulbs glow and extinguish, here and there, without illumination. There is sound; now loud, now low, its source and direction uncertain, then silence. Smells; oil or burning rubber. Touch; your shin strikes an iron bar, a...
by RobertTownsend | Jun 25, 2011 | Deception, Publishing, Russia, Soviet Union
The purpose of this web site is to make sense of liars whom I’ve lived and worked among, against, and for in my life. There are moments when I shake with rage at the memory of trust broken; as well I quiver with shame at the memory of breaking trust. We deceive...