Episode 013 – Spies and Espionage

This episode we take on books about Spies and Espionage, which meant extra painful reading for Anna. We tackle topics like how to pronounce John Le Carré’s name, if the Cold War is necessary for the spy-espionage genre, how to use Novelist to read diversely, whether we need a “Badass Women” subject heading, if spy novels are fundamentally boring, what to do when authors don’t write their own books, and if it ever hurts to call officers “dude”.

Your Hosts This Episode

Anna Ferri | Meghan Whyte | Matthew Murray | Amanda Wanner

Recommended

• Clementine by Cherie Priest
• Your Republic is Calling You by Young-Ha Kim, translated by Chi-Young Kim
• Cowboy Angels by Paul McAuley
• League of Unexceptional Children by Gitty Daneshvari (Middle Grade)
• The Man Who Was Thursday by G.K. Chesterton
• The Bletchley Girls by Tessa Dunlop (Non-Fiction)
• Women Heroes of World War II by Kathryn J. Atwood  (Non-Fiction)
• Etiquette & Espionage by Gail Carriger (YA on the younger side)
• Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein (try the audiobook – it’s good)
• Corporate Spies: the Pizza Plot (article)

Read

• By Tess Gerritsen:
• • In Their Footsteps
  • Call After Midnight

• Spy School by Stuart Gibbs (Middle Grade)
• Harriet Spies Again by Helen Ericson and maybe Louise Fitzhugh (Middle Grade)
• From Russia With Love by Ian Fleming
• Bourne Identity by Robert Ludlum

Did Not Finish

• The Agency by Y. S. Lee
• Hunt for Red October by Tom Clancy (We can totally see why people like this one; it’s just not for Anna)
• Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy by John le Carré

Also read, not mentioned:

• Octopussy and the Living Daylights by Ian Fleming
• The Tsar of Love and Techno by Anthony Marra (Recommended)
• Super Spy, and The Lost Dossiers by Matt Kindt (Comic)
• 2 Sisters by Matt Kindt (Comic)
• The Prisoner by Thomas M. Disch 
• Polar: Came from the Cold by Victor Santos (Comic)

 Links/Other

• Queen and Country by Greg Rucka and various artists (Comic) Recommended
• Velvet by Ed Brubaker and Steve Epting (Recommended)
• Sleeper by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips (Recommended)
• Ghost Money by Thierry Smolderen and Dominique Bertail
• Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh
• Spying on Miss Muller by Eve Bunting
• A Scanner Darkly by Philip K. Dick
• It’s awfully hard to figure out approximately how many titles are in NoveList, but you can learn more about it: What is Novelist
• Bible Verses Where “Behold” Has Been Replaced With “Look, Buddy”
• Article about browsing streams (For finding things like “Strong Female Characters”)
• Real life undercover police spies (depressing articles)
• • Inside the lonely and violent world of the Yard’s elite undercover unit
  • Woman wins undercover officer case against Met Police
  • Undercover policemen, undercover lovers
• Big Apple Takedown: Novel about “a new covert black-ops group using the Superstars of World Wrestling Entertainment”.
• The Worst Bestsellers podcast read Clancy
• The day we discovered our parents were Russian spies is an amazing and sad true story
• The appeal of spy fiction
• James Bond, spy fiction, and the decline of empire

Questions Has anyone read any Corporate Espionage books? What’s the appeal? What are your recommendations? How about books about hackers and/or social engineering? Is the stereotype of spy/espionage novels as male power fantasies unavoidable? Did we miss something on why spy/espionage novels appeal to readers?

“John le Carre” sample from the audiobook version of Call for the Dead, narrated by Michael Jayston.

The intermission music was Intermission by Unthunk from the Free Music Archive.

And a super extra-big thank you to Amanda Wanner, who has moved continents and will no longer be appearing regularly on the podcast. We’ll miss you!

Check out our Pinterest board and Tumblr posts for all the books about spies and espionage people in the club read (or tried to read), and follow us on Twitter!

Join us again on Tuesday, October 4th, when we discuss Historical Fantasy!