Read This! Part 3

Here’s part three of my book recommendations:

Tony Horwitz

A Voyage Long and Strange

Jeffrey Household

Rogue Male

Bill James

Panicking Ralph

John Krakauer

Under the Banner of Heaven

John LeCarre

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy

Smiley’s People

Elmore Leonard

Split Images (he is incredibly consistent – it’s hard to go wrong)

Michael Lewis

The Big Short

Janet Malcolm

The Journalist and the Murderer

Henning Mankell

The Return of the Dancing Master

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy

I get the “who’s your favorite author” question quite a bit and it’s a tough one to answer because there are so many great authors and great books that it’s not that easy to pin it down, and also because even the writers I like the most have their great books and their not-so-great books (Elmore Leonard may be the exception to this — his not-so-great books are still pretty damn good).  But if I was really forced to come up with something, I’d probably say that the John LeCarre of the Karla trilogy is my favorite. I’ve included the first and third of the trilogy. The second, The Honorable Schoolboy, isn’t of the same caliber. The other two, though, are just about perfect, in my opinion. George Smiley is a great character, embodying the weariness and moral compromise of the Cold Warriors.

If I had a dime for every uninspiring spy novel I’ve started because somebody compared it to “the best of John LeCarre,” I’d probably have like $2.80.