Favorite Spy Authors?

[happyjon]

Has to be Deighton and Le Carre, with their downbeat treatment of spy's adventures, a perfect antidote to Flemiing.
If I may diverge somewhat, the tv series Callan was brilliant. Gloomy but brilliant.

[speakingtohe]

Jack Higgins and Stuart Woods?

[GA Russell]

Originally Posted by happyjon

Has to be Deighton and Le Carre, with their downbeat treatment of spy's adventures, a perfect antidote to Flemiing.
If I may diverge somewhat, the tv series Callan was brilliant. Gloomy but brilliant.

For those of you who can watch Region 2 DVDs, Amazon UK is having a sale on its Callan colour episodes.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Callan-The-C...SIN=B0038409WE

[Pulpmeister]

I suppose it depends a little on what you mean by "spy".

I've been reading a few mouldy oldies lately: Ashenden, by W Somerset Maugham (who really was a secret agent in WW1); E Phillip Oppenheim's The Great Impersonation; Gavin Lyall's Major Maxim series; Joseph Conrad's "The Secret Agent"; Ian Fleming of course; then there's Michael Gilbert's Calder and Behrens series of short stories from EQMM (not easy to find in e-edition, if at all); Richard Condon's "The Manchurian Candidate"; Arthur C Clarke (yes, that Arthur C Clarke) "Earthlight", about the hunt for a spy on the moon; even The Saint in "The Saint on Guard".

The list is enormously long, and includes some surprising writers.

[Kumabjorn]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Len Deighton's another good author. He's written some excellent spy novels (eg he wrote "The IPCRESS File", which was made into a film starring Michael Caine). Deighton is a man of many talents: as well as being a novelist, he's a noted military historian, graphic artist, and author of cookery books.

He also wrote the screenplay for From Russia with Love and that Sean Connery Bond comeback Never Say Never Again, who knew?

[MrsAmandaK]

Just pinging this for reference -

thanks for all the reccs!

[mcrow]

I just started Reading Forsyth's "Odessa File", somehow I had not got around to reading it yet.

So far, I'm absolutely blown away by it. The sections where Miller is reading the diary of the Jewish prison camp survivor are horrifying but easily believeable and probably based on fact.

Great stuff.

[tompe]

I also like Le Carré and Len Deighton but the best one for me is Anthony Price:

http://www.tor.com/blogs/2010/02/his...-audley-series

[HarryT]

Thanks for the recommendation; I haven't come across Anthony Price, and I see that all his books are (in the UK at least) available as ebooks.

[Pulpmeister]

I'd forgotten Anthony Price; good stuff but a bit conversational. There's also Clive Egleton, another UK practioner of the spy genre; and Francis Clifford, whose "The Naked Runner" is particularly good. James Leasor, too now that I think of him, the Dr Jason Love series. One non-Jason Love story was called "Tank of Serpents" and set in mostly in Nepal. On a slightly dottier level, Fred Pohl's The Cool War is both s.f. and secret agent; and Colin Watson's "Hopjoy was Here" is a whodunit, with the plot confused by a very devious secret agent who may or may not be dead, (or even real) and who is being investigated by a pair of spoofed James Bonds.

As I say, all sorts of writers have popped up with spy stories, some of them very unexpected indeed.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Pulpmeister

I'd forgotten Anthony Price; good stuff but a bit conversational.

That is why I love it. Well written dialog usually make me like a book.

[mcrow]

Originally Posted by tompe

That is why I love it. Well written dialog usually make me like a book.

Dialog helps with pacing, IMO. Big walls of text with no dialog can really bog down a book for me.

[GoSharks]

With all of the UK residents here I'm surprised this one is missing...Alistair MacLean. Most of his are well paced and 'twisty'. Aside from two exceptions, he didn't do sequels which frequently leads to formula writing!

[tompe]

Originally Posted by GoSharks

With all of the UK residents here I'm surprised this one is missing...Alistair MacLean. Most of his are well paced and 'twisty'. Aside from two exceptions, he didn't do sequels which frequently leads to formula writing!

I am thinking of him as a thriller writer in spite of the fact that some of the novels have spies in them.

[GoSharks]

Originally Posted by tompe

I am thinking of him as a thriller writer in spite of the fact that some of the novels have spies in them.

I can see where you're coming from, though if Ludlum and Higgins can make this list then he's got to be on it!