ROBERT TOWNSEND

My wife, Patrice, and I live in France.

A subway platform with a deceptive advertisement reading 'Hang on... I think it might be a trap.'

This Web Log is about…

The purpose of this website is to make sense of the liars whom I've lived and worked for, among, and against. There are moments when I shake with rage at...
A logo with the text 'Liar's Path' and footsteps crossing a red circular line.

Towards the next novel

March 15, 2011And on reading War and Peace (Tolstoi), On War (Clausewitz) and War (Sun Tsu) Having just finished the first draft of the novel "Wounded," I have been thinking...
Soldiers inside a bunker during wartime, wearing numbered uniforms.

Memories from the time of Stalin

I am reading interviews about Soviet repression that the Russia Memorial (with assistance from Orlando Figes) gathered.Memorial, controversial in Russia (Vladimir Putin suppressed Memorial, but its archives are preserved outside the...
Numerous pink flamingo lawn ornaments scattered on green grass near a building.

History 419, 42 years later

September 7, 2010 A clap of thunder ricochets down Park Street in the space between the Mosse Humanities Building and Chadbourne Hall. Winds off Lake Mendota drive sheets of cold...
A man in a coat stands near bodies on a wet city street during wartime.

for whom I write

Siege of Leningrad In the winter of 2008-2009, Patrice and I taught English in Moscow to young Russian business people between the ages 25-40. English is the world language of...
A serene field with autumn-colored trees under a clear blue sky.

On the Edge of Things

To grow up in the northwoods was to grow up on the edge of things. On Mother’s day, Highway 17 filled with cars heading north past patches of dirty snow...