The Fire Agent

“The Fire Agent is one of those big, beautiful war novels about everything at the most important moment in history, and a story of individuals that actually lived through it.”—Lit Hub

“The Fire Agent is an utterly engrossing novel of espionage, love, and tragedy. From the emergence of industrial science in Germany to the shadowy spy networks of prewar Tokyo and the corridors of American intelligence, David Baerwald brings the secret machinery at the heart of 20th-century geopolitics roaring to life. I absolutely loved it.”—Kevin Powers, author of The Yellow Birds

“A novel of inspiring humanity and heartbreaking fallibility, The Fire Agent shines a spotlight on the echoes still reverberating to this day. It’s a spy novel, a war story, a love story. It is a brilliant piece of historical fiction that is hardly fictional at all.”—Graham Yost, executive producer of The Americans and Slow Horses

“Historical fiction on an epic scale. A page-turner about spies in prewar Tokyo but with the weight of moral inquiry at its heart and a fascinating look at a Japan we only thought we knew. A remarkable achievement.”—Joseph Kanon, author of Shanghai and The Good German

“A sweeping, cinematic swashbuckler of a novel—with an unforgettable love story at its heart—that brings the rise of global fascism during the first half of the twentieth century into sharp focus for us in the twenty-first. I wish I had an ancestor as astonishing and as honorable as Ernst Baerwald.”—Janice P. Nimura, author of Daughters of the Samurai: A Journey from East to West and Back

David Baerwald is an award-winning singer-songwriter, composer, and recording artist, best known for his critically acclaimed hit album with David Ricketts, Boomtown. He has collaborated with Joni Mitchell, Rickie Lee Jones, Sheryl Crow, Hans Zimmer, and Baz Luhrmann, among others. Baerwald spent a formative part of his childhood in Tokyo, grew up in Los Angeles, and currently lives in New York’s Hudson Valley. This is his first novel.