Customer Reviews

An Ordinary Spy: A Novel

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1 star:		(4)

 

 

I just finished reading "An Ordinary Spy" (in two days). It made me think some of Claire Berlinski's "Loose Lips" (a novel narrated by a woman going through the CIA's career trainee program...the same one that the narrator in this book went through) and perhaps a bit more like one of the stories in John LeCarre's "The Secret Pilgrim" (narrated by "Ned," a veteran of the British intelligence services).

Loose Lips: A Novel

The Secret Pilgrim (Coronet Books)

From what I've read about the clandestine world, "An Ordinary Spy" rings true. I wonder if some readers might find the redactions (some authentically imposed by the real CIA and some imposed by a fictional CIA censoring a former spook's memoir a bit annoying). I found them somewhat entertaining and found myself guessing where the fictional CIA officer was assigned ...my guess was India.

I think I would recommend that anyone aspiring to be a case officer read this book because it shows that to be an effective one, you have to be what a lot of people would consider hard-hearted...I think in a way it's a bit like wanting to be a doctor (if you can't stand the sight of blood, you aren't going to be a success). Similarly, if you don't have the right personality, you aren't going to be a success as a case officer. I think being a case officer is a worthwhile and commendable profession, but I know enough about myself to conclude that it's not something I would be good at or happy at. Because fundamentally, what a case officer does for a living is entice foreigners to betray their countries on the behalf of the United States. To be good at that, you have to be manipulative but also have a code of conduct that keeps you from going right off a moral cliff.

Finally, for those who like pondering the moral dilemmas posed by the spying game, they should read a nonfiction book written by James M. Olson, another former CIA officer, called "Fair Play" that examines dozens of fascinating scenarios and whether they are things that an American intelligence service should be doing or not doing.

Fair Play: The Moral Dilemmas of Spying

I came to AN ORDINARY SPY due to several very fine reviews, and for the first two thirds I was an entranced reader. Better than anyone else I've read, Joseph Weisberg captures the uncertainty of the spying trade: are you being followed or are you just being paranoid? This sense of unease augments both the novel's suspense and its authentic flavor.

And for the first two thirds AN ORDINARY SPY also seems bound to be a powerful novel about how ambition influences human relationships. Unfortunately, Weisberg didn't learn from le Carre and Greene how tragedy can make for great storytelling. Weisberg pulls most of his punches in a convoluted closing act. It seems the only sad ending is the one the protagonists don't notice, and it's reserved for the foreigner who's already suffered more than any of the ordinary spies.

Outside of the three Smiley books, this was one of the very rare spy novels that seemed realistic in terms of the trade. Having zero such experience myself, I cannot say that without reservation but it felt realistic and that was certainly refreshing. Mr. Weisberg is a pretty good writer as well and it made the book easy to read and follow. The redactions are a bit silly but don't detract from the story.

Ultimately, the whole thing was too slight. The story that bookends the book is so thin it is almost non-existent. [SPOLIERS BELOW] Goes to country x, blows it, comes home, and becomes a teacher. The motivation for this character were barely there and the resolution obvious. It's barely a third of the book.

The nested story is much more developed and better fleshes out the character. I wished he had dropped the bookend and just finished this story into the book. The second-hand telling shakes off any of the tension or immediacy that might otherwise have been developed.

I will note, that the 'William' character must be a hell of a guy if these two guys are his favorite sons. What, if anything, did they do to engender such loyalty? One has a brief good run followed by feeding actual fake materials (again, I'm not in the intelligence community, but that would seem to be really poorly received). The other has zero success and flames out virtually immediately. So he endeavours to help them help each other? I hated the all-seeing/all-knowing superior able to teach this guy learn his sensitive spy-lesson and then make his woman magically appear. Man, those anonymous postcards sure seem all-powerful.

I suppose the narrative fake-out allow for the twist at the end (was that a twist?). Whether it was or not, it was unecessary and, if anything, detracted from any potential emotional imact (if such was intended). Overall, I felt like he never had enough story for a book and the design was built to cover that but 60% of a book and 25% of a book tied together didn't do anything for me.

On a side note, our (first) hero drives a DODGE DART and has it SHIPPED to and from country X! WHAT? Well, no. Until someone from the CIA tells me different, I do not believe any foreign posted US official anywhere would be shipping a DODGE DART to say, Algeria or Kenya or Turkmenistan, no, no, no. What, he's going to do burnouts in front of the Syrian embassy? If I were the foreign intelligence service, I couldn't be more excited to have this 'spy' there! How easy would it be to tail a guy driving a Dodge Dart?! Nonsense. Dumbest spy-novel car since the guy in "Charm School" was driving a TRANS-AM through Soviet Russia.

What started out as a promising, realistic read became--at least for readers familiar with the business--sometimes tedious and unrealistic. The intertwined stories had a genuine ring to them and provided intriguing insights. Weisberg obviously debriefed CIA employees. The stories are told at a good pace and the book is a quick read. The "redactions" became annoying, however, and more extensive than the real thing. Worse, the redactions drained the stories of the rich local color and flavor that make espionage in a foreign country so fascinating. The disciplinary action was overdone (they don't invest a year of training at a huge expense only to can someone for poor judgment on a first tour). All in all, an okay read if you want a taste for what it's like.

As a former CIA emloyee the author is required to have his novel redacted by the agency censors. And that leads to a cute gimmick in this book. Entire sections, sometimes full pages, are blacked out as though they were the cuts the agency required. It is annoying for the first few pages but then becomes interesting as you try to figure out what it was the agency was supposed to be cutting. The plot moves along nicely and you do get a sense of the everday banality of the agency's work alongside its life endangering escapades. Most of the characters are nicely drawn and the author's style is straightforward if not very exciting or interesting. BUT, the ending is a mess as though the author didn't really know what to do so he threw everything against the wall and the reader is supposed to accept it and put it all together . The crappy last few chapters were slapped together just to end the damn thing.

I purchased this book from Dollar Tree for $1. The book states it was originally $23.99. This should have been my first clue it was terrible. I didnt even get a chance to review the book before purchasing because it was cheap and I was in a hurry. The title of the book caught my eye and that is why I purchased it. About 40% of the book text is blacked out. Some might think this would spark your imagination, but when entire paragraphs are backed out, its impossible to follow along. A note to the author, why even bother publishing this book when soo much is blacked out?

I'm not sure which is more pointless, this book, or the spying described in this book. Both are an utter waste of time and money!

The redacting gimmick is totally unnecessary and is, IMHO, a joke.
It might have been a good read if not for that. As it is, I couldn't get past the first two pages.

A very good read that has the patina of believability with its thorough character development. It is easy to see how one might find themselves acting like the author in similar circumstances. It is a refreshing change from the Ian Fleming shoot em up school of spy novels.

If you're interested in getting a true sense of how spies operate in the real world, the level of verisimilitude in An Ordinary Spy cannot be beaten. The author expertly evokes the hazy, sometimes mundane world of a CIA case officer where the only constant is the high degree of uncertainty baked into every situation.

But know what you're getting into -- this is not a James Bond type thriller. It's more of a case study in paranoia as experienced by actual CIA officers. For me, one of the greatest elements of the book was the high level of insight it offered into the nuts and bolts of CIA tradecraft -- how to evade surveillance, how to evaluate sources and the delicate dance involved in recruiting foreign nationals to betray their countries.

The novel is very well-written, with a dry, witty humor throughout. It's structured somewhat idiosyncratically in terms of where you expect the beginning, middle and end to be -- major plot points seem to occur at what would normally be considered the wrong time. For instance, imagine if Michael J. Fox in Back to the Future returned home in the middle of the movie instead of at the end. I was initially put off by this, but the writer ends up making the whole thing really work.

All in all, a very literate novel of the post-modern spy.