return to home  
Join   |  Gift   |  Member Login   |  Library Login
BookBrowse Mobile
Follow Us: 
   Summary and Book Reviews

A Spy by Nature: Summary and book reviews of A Spy by Nature by Charles Cumming, plus links to an excerpt from A Spy by Nature and a biography of Charles Cumming.

A Spy by Nature

A Spy by Nature
A Novel
by Charles Cumming
Hardcover: Jul 2007,
368 pages.
Paperback: Nov 2008,
368 pages.

Publication information
First book/First Novel


Author Information
Critics' Opinion:   
Readers' Rating:    Not Yet Rated
About BookBrowse Rankings
Share: 
Buy This Book

BOOK SUMMARY

This is what they told me a long time ago.
Only make contact in the event of an emergency.
Only telephone if you believe that your position has been fatally compromised.
Under no circumstances are you to approach us unless it is absolutely necessary in order to preserve the security of the operation.
This is the number.


Alec Milius is young, smart, and ambitious. He also has a talent for deception. He is working in a dead-end job when a chance encounter leads him to MI6, the elite British Secret Intelligence Service, handing him an opportunity to play center-stage in a dangerous game of espionage.

In his new line of work, Alec finds that the difference between the truth and a lie can mean the difference between life and death—and he is having trouble telling them apart. Isolated and exposed, he must play a role in which the slightest glance or casual remark can seem heavy with unintended menace. Caught between British and American Intelligence, Alec finds himself threatened and alone, unable to confide in even his closest friend. His life as a spy begins to exact a terrible price, both on himself and on those around him.

Richly atmospheric and chillingly plausible, A Spy By Nature announces the arrival of British author Charles Cumming as heir apparent to masters like John le Carré and Len Deighton. A bestseller in England, it’s the gripping story of a young man driven by ruthless ambition who finds himself chasing not just success, but survival.
BookBrowse

A well-researched novel with a surprisingly exciting and unexpected ending, which illuminates the decidedly unglamorous world of industrial espionage.  (Reviewed by BookBrowse Review Team).

Full Review Members Only (1058 words).

Media Reviews

  Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Smartly paced and intricately plotted, Cumming's decidedly unglamorous look at industrial espionage provides plenty of elaborate deceits, double crosses and other trappings of a first-class spy thriller.

  The Spectator - Charles Mitchell
Alec Milius, the protagonist of Charles Cumming's A Spy by Nature, has bagfuls of self-pity, but unfortunately he doesn't seem to have many other features or qualities, besides a rather shallow and self-regarding intelligence. This is a deliberate, but misguided, choice by Cumming, whose plot turns on the fact that Milius is a chippy loser who falls to pieces when placed by MI6 at the heart of an industrial espionage scam. It seemed implausible to me that MI6, or anyone else for that matter, would employ someone who was quite so obviously a broken reed, although I suppose that Cumming might invoke David Shayler to refute this point. The real weakness of this book, though, is that Milius has too little charm for the reader to want to spend much time with him. Truth may be stranger than fiction, but it can also be less interesting.

  The Mirror - Andrea Henry
Cumming's first novel is an intense study of the world of espionage. The Cold War may be over but for underachieving, 24-year-old Alec, the intelligence service is a viable career option. Rather than finding glamour and glory in his new guise, Alec discovers that the fake relationships he forges aren't what trouble him, it's the genuine ones he's left behind that are twisting his mind. Cumming ventures calmly and collectedly into the spy's psyche, but as the plot peters out you find yourself aching for the excitement of some James Bond-style fantasy to spice it all up.

  Sunday Telegraph (UK)
The book is well researched and deftly plotted, and though there is a clear debt to Deighton and le Carre, Cumming never seems like a mere imitator. His prose is efficient, rather than stylish, too many of the supporting characters fail to come to life, and there are moments when his "spy by nature" behaves so foolishly that one feels like screaming. Nevertheless, in its exciting closing stages, it is a book one would be seriously annoyed to have to put down, and the ending leaves the way tantalizingly open for what could prove an even stronger sequel.

  Literary Review - Philip Oakes
Witty, well-observed and glinting with quotable axioms. Most signally, though, a book that's written with a real loathing of espionage: self-justifying, ruthless and corrupting. A strong and serious entertainment; don't miss.

  Mail on Sunday - Andrew Roberts
From my own reminiscences of the procedure seven years before Cumming was himself accepted into the service (he trained for a short time before deciding to become a writer), I can attest that it is absolutely accurate in every detail, down to the appearance of the buildings, wording of the correspondence and nature of the cognitive tests. Anyone wishing to join the Secret Intelligence Service should certainly buy this book before undergoing the recruitment process ... For once, that is definitely not the teaser that spy writers habitually employ: Cumming writes it like it is.

Author Blurb Boris Starling, author of Vodka and Messiah
Who among us has never dreamed of being a spy? Charles Cumming takes this conceit and runs with it, pitching his everyman hero Alec Milius into ever-widening circles of betrayal and deceit. But Milius is no ersatz James Bond and there are no amphibious cars or exploding pens in sight, and the book is all the better for it. Cumming writes beautifully, equally at home with the broad brushstrokes of international geopolitics as he is with the finer dabs of nuance and subtlety .... It would be accurate but patronising to call this an excellent debut novel. It is an excellent novel full stop.

Author Blurb Robert Harris, author of Pompeii and Enigma
A wonderfully assured first novel. It has the ring of absolute authenticity. Tautly written, cleverly plotted...it reminded me strongly of the early books of John le Carré.

Recent Reader Reviews

Charles Cumming was born in Ayr, Scotland in 1971. He was educated at Eton and graduated from the University of Edinburgh with First Class Honours in English Literature in 1994. In the summer of 1995, he was approached for recruitment by the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), also known as MI6. The recruitment process described in A Spy By Nature is apparently based closely on his own experience to the point that he has been accused of breaking the spirit of the Officials Secret Act (as explained in an essay on his website).

A year later he moved to Montreal where he began working on a novel based on his experiences with the SIS. A Spy By Nature was bought in a two-book deal by Penguin in 1999. It was published in 2001 in the UK, but not until 2007 in the USA (by St Martins Press). The Hidden Man...

Continued...  Beyond the Book (members only)

Readalikes Full readalike results are for members only

If you liked A Spy by Nature, try these:


Absolute Friends
by John Le Carre

An epic tale of loyalty and betrayal set in the West Berlin of the 1960s through to the present day of terrorism and new alliances.

Agent Zigzag
by Ben Macintyre

Eddie Chapman was a charming criminal, a con man, and a philanderer. He was also one of the most remarkable double agents Britain has ever produced. Inside the traitor was a man of loyalty; inside the villain was a hero. The problem for Chapman, his spymasters, and his lovers was to know where one persona ended and the other began.


These are 2 of the 5 readalike suggestions for A Spy by Nature. Members have full access to all readalikes. If you are a member, please login. To find out more about membership, click here.


Become a Member
Click Here
Editor's Choice
  •  May 18 
  •  May 16 
  •  May 15 
The Woman Upstairs
Claire Messud

The Woman Upstairs Jacket

The riveting confession of a woman awakened, transformed, and betrayed by passion and desire for a world beyond her own.
How to Create the Perfect Wife
Wendy Moore

How to Create the Perfect Wife Jacket

Stranger than fiction, blending tragedy and farce, How to Create the Perfect Wife is an engrossing tale of the radicalism, and deep contradictions, at the heart of the Enlightenment.
Happier Endings
Erica Brown

Happier Endings Jacket

A wise and affirming meditation on living fully and preparing for death, written by a highly regarded spiritual teacher.
Click Here
   Most Recent Blog Entries
Jewish Young Adult Books That Are Not About The Holocaust
Books to Give This Mother's Day
A Short History of Chechnya
rss  RSS   rss  subscribe
Recent Reader Reviews
Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald by Therese Fowler
Z, the novel about the life of Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald is at points charming and; like another reviewer, I kept thinking of the movie, "Midnight... read more
Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver
Although heavy on the scientific details, which slowed down the story for me (OK, I admit, I was one of those liberal arts majors who skipped out on... read more
The House at the End of Hope Street by Menna van Praag
Loved this book. Magical, quirky, enchanting I could go on. All books do not have to be literary fiction, sometimes it is just so comforting to read... read more
RSS RSS feed More...  
Most Viewed This Week
1. Half the Sky
Nicholas D. Kristof, Sheryl WuDunn
2. The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind
William Kamkwamba
3. Because of Winn-Dixie
Kate DiCamillo
4. Eagle Strike
Anthony Horowitz
5. Gone Girl
Gillian Flynn
More...
Book Club Recommendations
The Gods of Gotham
by Lyndsay Faye
Paperback (Mar/13)
Forgotten Country
by Catherine Chung
Paperback (Mar/13)
Philida
by André Brink
Paperback (Feb/13)
Gone Girl
by Gillian Flynn
Hardback (Jun/12)
More...
First Impressions
Members read and review books often months before they're published. See what they think in First Impressions!
A Dual Inheritance
by Joanna Hershon
Four Stars            (May/13)
The Laws of Gravity
by Liz Rosenberg
4.5 Stars            (May/13)
The Sisterhood
by Helen Bryan
Four Stars            (Apr/13)
More...
  Latest BookBrowse News
U.S. ebook sales up in 2012, but rate of growth is slowing (May 16 2013)
In 2012, trade book sales (i.e. non academic book sales) rose 6.9%, to $15.049 billion, and e-book sales continued to grow, although the rate of growth... Full Story
rss RSS feed More...
 
BookBrowse Poll
Q: Do you mainly read newly published or older books?
Mainly newer books
Mainly older books
A mix of new and old books
Search: Title or Author
Free Newsletters
Bring Up the Bodies

Online Book Club
More about
Five Days
Join the discussion!


Win This Book!
The Pigeon Pie Mystery


Enter To Win Now!

wordplay
Solve this clue:
"I I M B T Give T T R"

and be entered
to win....
frame top
New Author
Interviews
Menna van Praag
Erica Brown
Helga Weiss
Kate Morton
frame bottom
HOME Book Submissions | Advertising | Library Subscriptions | Reviewing for BookBrowse | Contact Us