I would have to call that the most bizarre "Top However Many" list I have ever seen. Personally, I couldn't get through the Mailer book (which is a problem I have had with a lot of his stuff). Anyone who knows me will tell you I am a major fan of Rex Stout's work, and The Second Confession is a fine murder mystery, but it's no more an espionage or spy novel than it is a work of lyric poetry. Gorky Park is fringe-spy-novel territory.
Our Man in Havana and The Spy Who Came in From the Cold, those I'd buy as reasonable choices.
And...didn't we just have this discussion (albeit not limited to post-WW2 books)?
I don't know what is going on with The Strand, or at least its blogs, but it is sad to see a fine magazine deteriorate to the point that it printing gibberish. A few weeks ago one of their bloggers did a list of the Ten Best Women Detectives that included Irene Adler and Vivien Sternwood and said that Adler first appeared in the short story A Scandal in Belgravia.
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I would have to call that the most bizarre "Top However Many" list I have ever seen. Personally, I couldn't get through the Mailer book (which is a problem I have had with a lot of his stuff). Anyone who knows me will tell you I am a major fan of Rex Stout's work, and The Second Confession is a fine murder mystery, but it's no more an espionage or spy novel than it is a work of lyric poetry. Gorky Park is fringe-spy-novel territory.
Our Man in Havana and The Spy Who Came in From the Cold, those I'd buy as reasonable choices.
And...didn't we just have this discussion (albeit not limited to post-WW2 books)?
The Mailer book is a bad April Fool's Day joke a week late, or the guy is buts.
No Charles McCarry?
Nuts, not buts.
I thought the list was . . . eccentric. Some really weird choices.
My computer couldn't/wouldn't connect to the page, but I hope the list included THE QUILLER MEMORANDUM.
Nope.
I don't know what is going on with The Strand, or at least its blogs, but it is sad to see a fine magazine deteriorate to the point that it printing gibberish. A few weeks ago one of their bloggers did a list of the Ten Best Women Detectives that included Irene Adler and Vivien Sternwood and said that Adler first appeared in the short story A Scandal in Belgravia.
Ha.
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