Bestselling spy novelists, David McCloskey and Paul Vidich, join Joe Haddow for a good ole fashioned booking off!

As well as discussing their new novels ('The Seventh Floor' and 'The Poets Game'), they also share some great book recommendations and talk us through their writing processes.

Spy novels are such a great way to learn about world history - and have arguably never been more popular - so we delve a little more into this genre, referencing John Le Carre - and his son, Nick Harkaway, who was a recent Book Off guest. Joe's continued reading battle with Le Carre continues, and whilst confessing this again, Paul tries to his hardest to encourage him to pick up The Spy Who Came In From The Cold.

As well as lots of book chat, Joe and David share a love of Seinfeld, £75 martinis, and there's a bit of a natter about good French wine (but luckily, Joe hasn't been on the booze pre-recording like a previous ep!)

THE BOOK OFF

'All The Colours Of The Dark' by Chris Whitaker

VS

'The Quiet American' by Graham Greene

We hope you're enjoying Series 14!

Please do follow us on instagram, bluesky, and the others: @ohdobookoff

(here's some more gumf on our guests brilliant books)

The Poet's Game by Paul Vidich

Alex Matthews thought he had left it all behind. His CIA career, the viper's den of bureaucracy at headquarters and the lies and stress of the cat and mouse game of double agents. But then the Director came asking for a favour.

Alex is a different man from when he had run Moscow station, where he recruited a network of 'poet spies' including the one he names BYRON. He has pieced his life back together after a tragic boating accident killed his wife and daughter but the scars remain. But Alex remains, in his mind, a patriot, and so he begrudgingly accepts the Director's request. Something, though, is off about the whole operation from the start.

The Russians seem one step ahead and the CIA suspects there is a traitor in the agency. Alex realizes that by getting back into the game he has risked everything he has worked for: his new marriage, his family’s safety, his firm. As the noose tightens around Alex, and the FSB closes in, the operation becomes a hall of mirrors with no exits. To find redemption, Alex must uncover the secrets behind BYRON or lose everything.

The Seventh Floor by David McCloskey

All your life you're CIA. Then you're not.

A Russian arrives in Singapore with a secret to sell. When the Russian is killed and Sam Joseph, the CIA officer dispatched for the meet, goes missing, Artemis Procter is made a scapegoat and run out of the service. Traded back in a spy swap, Sam appears at Procter's central Florida doorstep months later with an explosive secret: there is a Russian mole hidden deep within the upper reaches of CIA.

As Procter and Sam investigate, they arrive at a shortlist of suspects made up of both Procter's closest friends and fiercest enemies. The hunt soon requires Procter to dredge up her own checkered past in service of CIA, placing her and Sam into the sights of a savvy Russian spymaster who will protect Moscow's mole in Langley at all costs, even if it means wreaking bloody havoc across the United States.

Bouncing between the corridors of Langley and the Kremlin, the thrilling new novel by David McCloskey explores the nature of friendship in a faithless business, and what it means to love a place that does not love you back.

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