Photo by Edvinas Kumšlytis

Bernardas Gailius is a historian and journalist. In his doctoral thesis and his first book “Partizanai tada ir šiandien” (Partisans Then and Today, 2006), he studied the Lithuanian partisan war and its legal, political and cultural consequences. He dedicated his book “Nusikaltimai prie Smetonos” (Crimes Under Smetona, 2008) to the history of crime and the intelligence services. His studies of the thriller genre are summarized in the book “Džeimsas Bondas. Mitas ir politika” ( James Bond. Myth and Politics, 2017). His first spy novel, “Kraujo kvapas” (The Smell of Blood), was published in 2022. “Agentė” (Spy Woman) is Gailius’s second spy novel.

       Kraujo kvapas (The Smell of Blood). Vilnius: Aukso žuvys, 2022. – 479 p. English and Polish sample translations available

“The explosion prevented her from finishing the poem. Or so the legends later claimed.” Beginning with an explosion in a partisan bunker at 4am on the night of 15 November 1949, Bernardas Gailius’ spy thriller immediately plunges the reader into a tense battlefield, where Andrius Karnauskas-Drakonas, the leader of the partisans of the Venta tėvūnija (detachment), and his men are up against the Soviet security agents who seek to destroy them. The struggle – in the name of Lithuania, freedom, and life – is fierce, as they strive to outwit and defeat their deadly enemy. This narrative by Gailius testifies to a couple of important points. Firstly, in 1949, the Second World War was not yet over in Lithuania – Lithuanian partisans, fighting fearlessly for a free Lithuania in its forests, were determined to regain the country they had lost at the beginning of the war. Secondly, five years of armed resistance against the invaders increasingly diminished any hope of victory. The weight of despair and helplessness was felt by the partisan commander, Drakonas, who, after much hesitation, finally resolved to look for a way to save his soldiers. “The Smell of Blood” shows in a compelling, literary way, with historical accuracy and detail, what the partisan war against the Soviet repression machine, against communism, looked like, and against what kind of murderers the Lithuanian intelligentsia of that time, having embarked on resistance and driven by self-sacrifice and idealism, had to fight. Reading this thriller in the context of Russia’s war against Ukraine is like reciting prayers: there are no light or easy paths in war, and war touches absolutely everyone.

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       Agentė (Spy Woman). Vilnius: Aukso žuvys, 2024. – 411 p. English sample translation available

This spy novel takes us back to interwar Kaunas: it’s 1938, the opposition to the then President of Lithuania, Antanas Smetona, along with efforts to form a coalition to overthrow him, are growing stronger. However, opposition leaders are not the only ones with plans; underground communists are also scheming. One of them, Angelė Treigytė, a trained communist and graduate of the International Lenin School, becomes this story’s protagonist. Having realised that her party activities are no longer as successful as they used to be, she resolves to act behind the communists’ backs to pursue her own desires: she embarks on a double game, becoming the Lithuanian Mata Hari, uniquely influencing the life of the State Security Department intelligence agent, Konstantinas Astrauskas. Agent Angelė talks about the work of security agencies in interwar Lithuania (the author was inspired by the memoirs of Jonas Budrys, a pioneering figure within counterintelligence operations in the interwar Republic of Lithuania); about intelligence gathering as the art of free will; about the communists, who operated invisibly yet convincingly; and about manipulations and dangerous spy games (the greatest danger, as always, was Moscow). In Gailius’s novel, Europe’s ominous predicament and the approaching Second World War loom in the background, but at the forefront is a compelling portrait of interwar Kaunas and the glamorously vibrant life of that era.

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Contact for rights: sigita@auksozuvys.lt

Contact for samples & other inquiries: kotryna.pranckunaite@lithuanianculture.lt