Following on from Oxford author Andrew Rosenheim’s last novel, Fear Itself, comes The Informant and the continuing tale of Jimmy Nessheim, ‘accidental’ FBI agent.

Nessheim is refused entry into the US army on medical grounds, and now languishes as FBI Advisor to a Hollywood film studio whose business is bigging up the FBI. This is LA in autumn 1941. Across the waters, Europe is in the grip of the Nazis, who now march across Russia. America is on the brink and Nessheim is stuck at his desk. Rosenheim focuses his thriller eye on the ominous threat of war with Japan, in these last days before Pearl Harbor.

Nessheim’s boss, Guttman, is told the Russians have penetrated the US government. Guttman’s source is murdered. There’s more: 50,000 dollars wired by Russian intelligence officers in New York to a Japanese bank in LA.

Help is at hand in the guise of informant Billy Osaka, Japanese-American and one for the ladies. Billy tells Nessheim he has some important news, then vanishes. Through his contacts, Nessheim uncovers a potent conspiracy to nudge America into war.

Rosenheim was hailed by the Independent as the ‘successor to Frederick Forsyth’ and this is certainly a cool thriller, almost noir-like, shady and uncertain.

It’s easy to imagine Humphrey Bogart slipping down the winding alleys of this novel, with “deep-set eyes the colour of chocolate”, and lines like: “He stood out like a split nail in a manicure bar.”

The prose is taut and muscular, masculine even. It holds your attention and it’s easy to turn the page. The author also provides a rich sense of place as Nessheim follows the trail from sun-baked California. As well as its storytelling, this novel carries a historical theme. Here is the modern-day superpower just before its explosion on to the world stage.

America is young and mighty, poised for glory, racially and culturally diverse, yet conflicted by that same diversity. And it’s Nessheim in the thick of it.