Wonderfully original and fresh, "The Crook Factory: mixes fact with suspenseful fiction. What's more, the book reads entirely like a fact-filled essay, illuminating the life of a literary icon- Ernest "Papa" Hemingway, as well as painting a vivid picture of Cuba, it's countryside, it's people, it's culture in the 1940s.

In the summer of '42, FBI agent Joe Lucas has come to Cuba at the behest of J. Edgar Hoover to keep a close eye on Ennest Hemingway, who wants to play spy during the war. Lucas has been instructed to become Hemingway's right hand man, gaining the writer's trust and friendship. Is Lucas up for it?

The novel is peopled with many fascinating characters- an American millionaire, a 12-year old Cuban orphan, a Spanish jai alai player, a priest, a fisherman. All are playing a dangerous game of espionage. Are they ready for it?

Dan Simmons, whose novels include "Hyperion," "Song of Kali," and "Fires of Eden," has written his best novel yet. It's as if he interviewed Hemingway himself. It's as if he himself was in the midst of Hemingway's life in war-time Cuba, and he just thinking back.

Hemingway's life has reached the stages of myth. The writer of such classics as "For Whom the Bell Tolls," and "The Green Hills of Africa," is unquestionably one of the most important writers and the most colorful of this century. In "The Crook Factory" we see another side of Hemingway- the macho, beer-guzzling, fishing, spy playing egoist, who swears, and can be mean and nasty, but at the same time, be charming and warm.