Wednesday, May 23, 2007

Spooks

Author Samantha Weinberg (who writes under the pseudonym of Kate Westbrook) recently shared with "The Week" (British magazine) readers who six favorite spy books. Ms. Weinberg's list included:

  • Casino Royale by Ian Fleming -- Bond, James Bond of course!!
  • Our Man in Havana by Graham Greene
  • Kim Philby: The Spy I loved by Eleanor Philby -- little did she know he was gay!
  • The Spy who Came in From the Cold by John le Carre
  • Next Stop Execution by Oleg Gordievsky
  • The Spanish Game by Charles Cumming

Clearly Ms. Weinberg is better read than myself but I must say I was surprised she did not list "Spycatcher" by Peter Wright as one of her six favorites. Since she did mention a book about Kim Philby -- who is featured prominently in "Spycatcher" -- in her list I thought she might mention Wright's book.

One potential reason for the omission -- Spycatcher was banned in the U.K. since it was viewed as detrimental to the history and effectiveness of MI-5, the UK's spy agency:

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B0DEEDE103DF932A3575BC0A961948260

I am happy to report that I have read this book and hope my neighbor returns it one day so I can share it with my British friends.

Todd

2 comments:

Jeff Deitering said...

I have also read Spycatcher. Very enlightening. Eavesdropping using a flat washer in the tele: BRILLIANT!

Jeff Deitering said...

You may also want to try "The Catcher Was a Spy"