The Break is a suspense novel. The protagonist of the story, Sergei Tuvan, a Russian Army officer, decides to defect 'to the west from his station in East Germany. The story examines his decision to defect and describes his subsequent escape. The motivation of the protagonist reflects the author's belief that political and social defection has reached its current volume mainly because present day man finds himself in the unenviable position of being the captive of a social order to which he must sacrifice an unhealthy portion of his personal sanctity in order to maintain his citizenship. When the individual becomes restless in our present interdependent-conformist society, he sometimes seeks, as does our protagonist, a new and meaningful dimension to life within the confines of another political subdivision. The risks that defection demand often commits the individual to acts of violence that are beyond his real character.
