Spy Novels - search/destroy

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when I saw The Tailor Of Panama a while ago, I thought "I really must start reading those literary British spy novels by people like John Le Carre, Graham Greene, and those other guys". "Good idea" I thought back to myself, "You're on the money again. Well done that Vicar."

Of course I haven't bothered doing anything of the sort. But maybe you could advise me of good books to start with?

― DV, Thursday, 14 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

DON'T start with the tailor of panama: it is a feeble lowpoint in lecarre's v.patchy oeuvre

― mark s, Thursday, 14 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

the film is top, though.

― DV, Thursday, 14 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

The film is so-so DV. The ending is particularly rushed and poor, and Geoffrey Rush marrying Jamie Lee Curtis does not convince. Not only that but Pierce Brosnan seems far to self satisfied so-called subverting the Bond role.

Supporting cast do a good job though.

I always enjoyed the Charlie Muffin books (Brian Freemantle). Hugely cynical, a step on from Harry Palmer.

― Pete, Thursday, 14 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

yeah i thought the film was awful: josh k likes it though

― mark s, Thursday, 14 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Spy novels were all over the house when I was growing up. I never really got into them but do read The Spy Who Came In From The Cold for starters. and A Perfect Spy. Len Deighton's okay - I've only read City Of Gold which I don't remember although it's about North Africa so I must have liked it, and SS-GB which was good. The Game, Set, Match, Hook, Line, Sinker, Faith, Hope, Charity series looks waaay too daunting to start on. (Alternate reality detective story where the Germans won - much better than Thomas Harris's Fatherland which tried the same sort of thing.) Oh, and Bond is really quite a good read, despite what anyone tells you.

― Sam, Thursday, 14 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Sentences out of order.

Alternate reality detective story = SS-GB

― Sam, Thursday, 14 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I really liked SS-GB. It's much better than the better regarded Fatherland, which reads almost like a rip-off of it (not so much in being Alternate History, more the similarity of having an honest cop trying to dodge bad Nazis who falls in with a sexy american journalist).

So I might read some other books by Len Deighton sometime.

― DV, Thursday, 14 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

On the non-fiction tip, I would recommend The Catcher Was a Spy by Nicholas Dawidoff. It is about the espionage activities of Moe Berg, a 3rd string catcher in the Majors. Interesting reading.

― Ron Hudson, Thursday, 14 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

HARRIET THE SPY! ahh. yes!

― elizabeth anne marjorie, Friday, 15 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Your mark of quality: JOSH K LIKES IT THOUGH

― Josh, Friday, 15 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

three months pass...

Some suggestions for classic spy thrillers: Graham Greene's "Our Man in Havana"; Rudyard Kipling's "Kim"; anything written by Len Deighton; Frederick Forsyth's "The Day of The Jackal." Maybe next year at this time you will be able to read my spy novel, "Terminated - With Extreme Pleasure."

Dave DeHart

― David F. DeHart, Wednesday, 3 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

but how will we remember your name?

― mark s, Wednesday, 3 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Not strictly speaking a spy novel because the spying develops more by accident, but I love 'Riddle Of The Sands'. I believe there were a lot of rumours around that time (1900-14) of Germans roaming around Essex and the Isle of Sheppey (anywhere near Naval bases and dockyards etc.), and of course the German Navy was churning out the Dreadnoughts. This novel taps into those concerns but I like it because it makes me want to take up yachting.

― David, Wednesday, 3 July 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

eight years pass...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/8015180/MI6-used-bodily-fluids-as-invisible-ink.html

In October he noted that he "heard from C that the best invisible ink is semen", which did not react to the main methods of detection. Furthermore it had the advantage of being readily available.

hey girl the CIA is after me and I need to send a letter using invisible ink...help me out

― dayo, Wednesday, 22 September 2010 01:13 (fifteen years ago)

worst euphemism ever

― Elvis Telecom, Wednesday, 22 September 2010 01:27 (fifteen years ago)

four years pass...

spy who came in from the cold, tho

― post you had fecund thoughts about (darraghmac), Friday, 13 March 2015 00:19 (eleven years ago)

yah, that's a good one

― rb (soda), Friday, 13 March 2015 00:26 (eleven years ago)

Well, how about that?

http://www.amazon.com/TERMINATED-EXTREME-PLEASURE-David-DeHart/dp/1601452160

― JoeStork, Friday, 13 March 2015 07:10 (eleven years ago)

lol he reviewed his own book (4/5)

― JoeStork, Friday, 13 March 2015 07:12 (eleven years ago)

six years pass...

https://crimereads.com/adam-diment-spy-fiction/?fbclid=IwAR0ihp3Glf_N-9I-P7B89Lrd22VWRSNxQZQFCGS6XGY5T_ufhrswkKsfU2o

― Daniel_Rf, Friday, 2 July 2021 15:40 (four years ago)

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