Bill Pronzini – The Mammoth Book of Short Spy Novels

Short Spy Novels

Type:

Spy, Mystery

Rating: 8/10

Review:

This one is a great collection to have. After reading through all the novellas within it, I felt that I may have missed out on a few good authors.

Well, the James Bond novella was a kind of let down but that was just because it was keeping in gist of the book’s genre. I was expecting a bit more action, but that one died out pretty soon, with just Bond doing a lil bit of talking.

Erle Standley Gardner is one of my fave authors, but then the character I like best is Perry Mason. I guess I love the law stuff more than the spy stuff.

W. Somerset Maugham – The Traitor

TYPE: Espionage – Mystery

RATING: 6/10

REVIEW:

This one seemed way too detailed for me to consider it worth reading. It is considered one of the best spy novels that has been written, but I guess I beg to differ.

The story is about Maugham’s favourite spy Ashenden being sent to Switzerland to see a traitor and then get him to go to England so that they may be able to execute him for his treachery.

DESCRIPTION:

Ashenden finds himself made a bait to hook one of the traitors of the Queen’s kingdom. It is his task, and he has to find his own means, of getting the traitor back to England by all means possible.