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Alan Furst's Reading List

The author of “Mission to Paris” and, most recently, “Midnight in Europe” is a great fan of John le Carré’s Karla trilogy. “George Smiley is the all-time harassed bureaucrat of spy fiction.”

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By the Book: Alan Furst (2014)

NYT By the Book column (2014-05-29).

Source: www.nytimes.com

Cover of Titian: His Life
Titian: His Life
Sheila Hale · Buy on Amazon
"What I especially like about the book is that it is also a dense history of Venice in the 16th century: kings, doges, emperors, popes, Ottoman invasions."
Cover of The Broken Road
The Broken Road
Patrick Leigh Fermor · Buy on Amazon
"they are transcendent works, narratives of Leigh Fermor's walk across Europe in the early 1930s — descriptions of lands and their people in the most elegant, beautiful prose to be found anywhere."
Cover of A Dance to the Music of Time
A Dance to the Music of Time
Anthony Powell · Buy on Amazon
"Powell does everything a novelist can do, from flights of aesthetic passion to romance to comedy high and low. His dialogue is extraordinary. Anthony Powell taught me to write."
Cover of A Coffin for Dimitrios
A Coffin for Dimitrios
Eric Ambler · Buy on Amazon
"The book had a powerful, inspiring effect on me as a novelist."
Cover of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
John le Carre · Buy on Amazon
"Le Carre's voice — patrician, cold, brilliant and amused — was perfect for the wilderness-of-mirrors undertow of the Cold War."
Cover of Our Man in Havana
Our Man in Havana
Graham Greene · Buy on Amazon
"that British upper-class voice saying droll things."
Cover of The Discovery of France
The Discovery of France
Graham Robb · Buy on Amazon
"Graham Robb, when he sees a chance to be amusing, is an extremely funny writer."
Cover of Something Wicked This Way Comes
Something Wicked This Way Comes
Ray Bradbury · Buy on Amazon
"I really did stay up all night reading"
Cover of The Praise Singer
The Praise Singer
Mary Renault · Buy on Amazon
Cover of The Caine Mutiny
The Caine Mutiny
Herman Wouk · Buy on Amazon
"reread last year, still terrific."

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