Book Review: Agent Running in the Field

Nat is a seasoned professional spy and bad-to-the-bone badminton player. LeCarre takes it from there telling a story of a spy running a section, running other spies, all while working on his marriage and being father.

The Russian spies seem civil compared to the Russians of the Soviet era but what would the reader expect of a dying society led by a cabal of kleptocrats? The FSB no longer spies for ideological reasons. No sir. They’re in it for the money! A disgruntled British civil servant who is disgusted with his country’s departure from the EU, as well as harboring a deep seated horror, hatred, and anger over Donald Trump approaches those sticky-fingered Russians with an offer he thinks they can’t refuse.

Written well before Putin’s adventure in Ukraine exposed the rot of their system, the Russian operators move like spy craft and tradecraft operators of yore exhibiting all the best practices of the agent in the field. The tradecraft is classic LeCarre. A writer who has served as an eye into the opaque world of espionage this is yet another believable procedural tale of sorts of just how bureaucratic the whole endeavor is.

There is a bit of confusion at the end of the story. But overall a satisfying read.