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Siro
“A riveting imagined world, so real in fact that one always wonders if it is imagined at all.” —Scott Turow
Made restless by the tightening restrictions of CIA bureaucracy, agent Alan Taylor oversteps moral and legal bounds in a top-secret mission to destabilize the Soviet Union. His new recruit—the beautiful Anna Barnes, who struggles with complex feelings for Taylor—receives a deeper education than she signed up for in David Ignatius’s trademark world of shifting international and domestic pressures, hidden loyalties, and secret agendas.625 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1991
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About the author
David Ignatius
34 books726 followersDavid Ignatius, a prize-winning columnist for the Washington Post, has been covering the Middle East and the CIA for more than twenty-five years. His novels include Agents of Innocence, Body of Lies, and The Increment, now in development for a major motion picture by Jerry Bruckheimer. He lives in Washington, DC.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 67 reviews
July 22, 2016
David Ignatius may be the finest writer of REALISTIC espionage books on the planet. If you want characters like James Bond who have extraordinarily physical and mental skills as well being pure of heart, you will not find them in an Ignatius book. He shows what I imagine to be the day to day, slow moving nature of actual espionage work.
SIRO deal with a young, up and coming agent and and older more experienced and, as a result, more cynical one who partner under the direction of an agency oldtimer who is actually somewhat of a legend. There is a certain murkiness to the storyline as it is often unclear who is doing what to whom. This uncertainty added greatly to my enjoyment as I read Siro. The two main characters are very well developed as are the setting in which the story occurs. In essence, this is a coming of age story of the younger agent, having been pulled into espionage work when she was a bit reluctant, acting quite naively as she begun the assignment and then having matured as she began to see the shadier side of the business and the people involved in it.
Ignatius built a great deal of suspense and tossed in a couple of surprises, which also added to fun. I unhesitatingly recommend this book to any who like a well written, complex espionage story that, on the surface, seems entirely plausible.
SIRO deal with a young, up and coming agent and and older more experienced and, as a result, more cynical one who partner under the direction of an agency oldtimer who is actually somewhat of a legend. There is a certain murkiness to the storyline as it is often unclear who is doing what to whom. This uncertainty added greatly to my enjoyment as I read Siro. The two main characters are very well developed as are the setting in which the story occurs. In essence, this is a coming of age story of the younger agent, having been pulled into espionage work when she was a bit reluctant, acting quite naively as she begun the assignment and then having matured as she began to see the shadier side of the business and the people involved in it.
Ignatius built a great deal of suspense and tossed in a couple of surprises, which also added to fun. I unhesitatingly recommend this book to any who like a well written, complex espionage story that, on the surface, seems entirely plausible.
February 20, 2019
Unlike many in this genre, Siro didn't buzz with action packed sequences or steam with romantic tension. Instead, it offered a fairly stark and measured view of the life of an intelligence operative, complete with the anxieties, moral ambiguity, and (yes, even) boredom that come with waiting for things to happen. In short, it felt much more authentic than many of the books I've read. Because of this, it was perhaps never destined for commercial success, but it was successful for me. I thoroughly enjoyed it and look forward to reading other books by David Ignatius.
September 12, 2018
1979 was a watershed year in world affairs:
** Islamic forces led by the Ayatollah Khomeini overthrew the Shah of Iran and imprisoned 90 hostages in the US embassy in Tehran.
** At the White House, President Anwar Sadat of Egypt and Prime Minister Menachem Begin of Israel signed a peace treaty.
** Civil war broke out in El Salvador, and the Sandinista National Liberation Front overthrew the dictatorship of Anastasio Somoza in Nicaragua.
** Provisional IRA terrorists killed Lord Mountbatten in Ireland.
** The United States and the People's Republic of China established full diplomatic relations.
** And the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan.
This is the tumultuous historical setting in the background of David Ignatius' dazzling novel of espionage, Siro. It's the most intelligent spy novel I've read in many years.
When the CIA was dysfunctional
The 1970s brought little but trouble for the CIA. The legacy of Allen Dulles' long tenure at the helm of the agency was scandal. One after another, Congressional investigators brought to light the ugly reality of the nation's most visible intelligence service: Watergate, the bungled operations, the assassinations and attempted assassinations of heads of state, the intervention in domestic affairs. Directors appointed to reform the agency forced out much of the old guard, with the heaviest toll landing on the clandestine Directorate of Operations. By 1979, the few survivors of the CIA's early years considered the agency to be dysfunctional. One of those survivors is one of the three central characters in Siro.
A relic of what was best and most enduring
Edward Stone is the former chief of the Near East Division. Like others present at the founding of the agency, he had fought in the OSS during World War II. Unlike most of his peers, he was still in place three decades later. He survived on the strength of his friendships with colleagues in senior leadership positions and by keeping a low profile in an obscure position outside the agency's hierarchy. Stone laments the deplorable condition into which the CIA has fallen, with those he considers politicians and paper-pushers calling the shots and hobbling every attempt to take action. "He saw himself, in the twilight of his career, as a relic of what was best and most enduring about the America that had grown up so quickly during and after World War II—namely, the Central Intelligence Agency."
To put the agency back on the offensive against the Soviet Union, Stone undertakes a secret plan to stir up nationalist sentiment in the Islamic Soviet republics of Central Asia. He finds his agents in the disgruntled veteran officer who heads the US Consul in Istanbul and an idealistic young woman who is barely out of training as an officer. In Siro, we follow the action that unfolds in chapters that alternate among these three principal characters.
The most intelligent spy novel I've read in many years
Most popular spy novels tend to be saturated with violence. Gunfights. Car chases. And battles of wits between ruthless CIA and KGB officers. There's nothing of that in Siro. The book is an intelligent spy novel . . . an entirely believable account of the business of espionage as it must actually be conducted:
** The Agency's Director sends a memo to all supervisory staff on "Managing by Objectives," assigning 20 objectives and requiring everyone to explain how they're implementing them.
** Somebody in the Director's office becomes obsessed about gunrunning from Bulgaria into Turkey and insists all CIA personnel in the two countries actively investigate. But they all know guns are coming into Turkey through a number of other channels.
** Intelligence officers burn out, often break the rules, and forget passwords.
** And all the while the KGB runs circles around the CIA, tapping every line of communication in and out of every American property in the Soviet Union and identifying every US asset.
This is the real world, not James Bond's or Gabriel Allon's.
The Soviet republics of Central Asia were all once Turkestan
The action in Siro involves a land known to many of its present-day inhabitants as Turkestan. Turkestan is a geographical and cultural expression, not a nation-state in the modern sense of the term. Its history reaches back to the fourth century BCE, but it's most easily described as the remnants of Genghis Khan's 13th-century empire. The land stretches from the Gobi desert in the east to the shores of the Caspian Sea in the west, with Siberia to the north and Afghanistan, Kashmir, and Tibet to the south. It encompasses today's modern "Stans" and the sprawling western Chinese province of Xinjiang. The common element is that Turkic languages dominate the region. This is the site of Edward Stone's private war against the USSR.
About the author
David Ignatius is an associate editor and columnist for the Washington Post, where he has worked since 1986. He is also a familiar television commentator. The first of his 10 novels to date was published in 1987. He was educated at Harvard and Cambridge Universities.
** Islamic forces led by the Ayatollah Khomeini overthrew the Shah of Iran and imprisoned 90 hostages in the US embassy in Tehran.
** At the White House, President Anwar Sadat of Egypt and Prime Minister Menachem Begin of Israel signed a peace treaty.
** Civil war broke out in El Salvador, and the Sandinista National Liberation Front overthrew the dictatorship of Anastasio Somoza in Nicaragua.
** Provisional IRA terrorists killed Lord Mountbatten in Ireland.
** The United States and the People's Republic of China established full diplomatic relations.
** And the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan.
This is the tumultuous historical setting in the background of David Ignatius' dazzling novel of espionage, Siro. It's the most intelligent spy novel I've read in many years.
When the CIA was dysfunctional
The 1970s brought little but trouble for the CIA. The legacy of Allen Dulles' long tenure at the helm of the agency was scandal. One after another, Congressional investigators brought to light the ugly reality of the nation's most visible intelligence service: Watergate, the bungled operations, the assassinations and attempted assassinations of heads of state, the intervention in domestic affairs. Directors appointed to reform the agency forced out much of the old guard, with the heaviest toll landing on the clandestine Directorate of Operations. By 1979, the few survivors of the CIA's early years considered the agency to be dysfunctional. One of those survivors is one of the three central characters in Siro.
A relic of what was best and most enduring
Edward Stone is the former chief of the Near East Division. Like others present at the founding of the agency, he had fought in the OSS during World War II. Unlike most of his peers, he was still in place three decades later. He survived on the strength of his friendships with colleagues in senior leadership positions and by keeping a low profile in an obscure position outside the agency's hierarchy. Stone laments the deplorable condition into which the CIA has fallen, with those he considers politicians and paper-pushers calling the shots and hobbling every attempt to take action. "He saw himself, in the twilight of his career, as a relic of what was best and most enduring about the America that had grown up so quickly during and after World War II—namely, the Central Intelligence Agency."
To put the agency back on the offensive against the Soviet Union, Stone undertakes a secret plan to stir up nationalist sentiment in the Islamic Soviet republics of Central Asia. He finds his agents in the disgruntled veteran officer who heads the US Consul in Istanbul and an idealistic young woman who is barely out of training as an officer. In Siro, we follow the action that unfolds in chapters that alternate among these three principal characters.
The most intelligent spy novel I've read in many years
Most popular spy novels tend to be saturated with violence. Gunfights. Car chases. And battles of wits between ruthless CIA and KGB officers. There's nothing of that in Siro. The book is an intelligent spy novel . . . an entirely believable account of the business of espionage as it must actually be conducted:
** The Agency's Director sends a memo to all supervisory staff on "Managing by Objectives," assigning 20 objectives and requiring everyone to explain how they're implementing them.
** Somebody in the Director's office becomes obsessed about gunrunning from Bulgaria into Turkey and insists all CIA personnel in the two countries actively investigate. But they all know guns are coming into Turkey through a number of other channels.
** Intelligence officers burn out, often break the rules, and forget passwords.
** And all the while the KGB runs circles around the CIA, tapping every line of communication in and out of every American property in the Soviet Union and identifying every US asset.
This is the real world, not James Bond's or Gabriel Allon's.
The Soviet republics of Central Asia were all once Turkestan
The action in Siro involves a land known to many of its present-day inhabitants as Turkestan. Turkestan is a geographical and cultural expression, not a nation-state in the modern sense of the term. Its history reaches back to the fourth century BCE, but it's most easily described as the remnants of Genghis Khan's 13th-century empire. The land stretches from the Gobi desert in the east to the shores of the Caspian Sea in the west, with Siberia to the north and Afghanistan, Kashmir, and Tibet to the south. It encompasses today's modern "Stans" and the sprawling western Chinese province of Xinjiang. The common element is that Turkic languages dominate the region. This is the site of Edward Stone's private war against the USSR.
About the author
David Ignatius is an associate editor and columnist for the Washington Post, where he has worked since 1986. He is also a familiar television commentator. The first of his 10 novels to date was published in 1987. He was educated at Harvard and Cambridge Universities.
April 13, 2021
Act 1 is a little short on plot, but after the story gets set up, the book starts rolling until the expected melancholic and realistic resolution.
June 13, 2017
Siro, amazing read about 1979-80: I have done quite a bit of reading in Ottoman history and finally visited Istanbul twice two years ago on my to and from the Lycian Coast and, during this year, I have been reading intensely into Putin's history, to amplify my study of Russian history. I love David Ignatius as an espionage writer with great emphasis on the CIA but I was disappointed to see that this book just focused on 1970-80--UNTIL I got into this gripping book. Others have summarized the characters and general plot excellently so I won't repeat that task. Instead I will just focus on a few topics that gripped me. First, what Stone, Taylor, Barnes and their sidekicks set out to do: to trick the KGB into thinking that the CIA was working with the majority Islamic border nations of the USSR to break away from the USSA. What an amazing idea and, knowing Ignatius's background, I would love to know what factual bases he built this idea from. Second, the description of Anna Barnes' dissertation research and her RETURN to the Ottoman Collection in the Athens library was reminiscent of what I had read of the struggles of actual researchers trying to access relevant files. Third, Anna's dealing with that swarmy slimy Ali Ascari almost gave me nightmares. I found myself hoping she had killed him but I knew that would have done in the plot too early in the book. Well, those are a few of my reactions. I am still enjoying reading others' reviews of SIRO.
September 9, 2023
Misogynistic, orientalist, chauvinistic, boring… in short, bad.
May 22, 2010
This book is about the CIA , and takes place in Turkey . Great book should be a movie
# Siro by David Igntiua
David Ignatius
Reviewed by Richard Gid Powers | May 10, 1991
Ignatius is of Armenian descent with ancestors from Harput, Elazığ, Turkey.[1:][2:] Ignatius's father, Paul Robert Ignatius, is a former Secretary of the Navy and president of The Washington Post.
Ignatius was raised in Washington, D.C., where he attended St. Albans School. He then attended Harvard College, where he was an editor of the Harvard Crimson and from which he graduated magna cum laude in 1973. After college, he was awarded a Frank Knox Fellowship by Harvard and studied at King's College, Cambridge, where he received a diploma in economics. He is married to Dr. Eve Thornberg Ignatius, with whom he has three daughters
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
rom the American Century to the Organization Man to the Me Generation, David Ignatius' spy thriller, Siro, charts the rise and fall of the CIA through three generations of its agents. The title comes from a State Department code word for the agency, which, in a typically caustic sentence from the novel, is described as sounding ''like the beginning of something interesting, like 'seraglio' or 'sirocco' but in fact meant nothing at all.''
Ignatius, the foreign editor of The Washington Post, has an insider's grasp of recent world crises and an unusual talent for inserting CIA operatives into those events. His excellent first novel, Agents of Innocence (1987), described the meltdown of Lebanon during the early '70s. This time the setting is 1979 on the Soviet-Turkish border, where Moslem nationalism — encouraged by a rogue CIA campaign-has begun to shake the Soviet Union.
Edward Stone, the man behind the plot, is a member of the CIA's founding old guard of OSS veterans (with more than a soup-on-the-tie resemblance to William Casey). Stone is frustrated that the Carter-era CIA is missing out on a chance to deliver a knockout punch to the Soviet Union. To set the East ablaze he picks two operatives: the CIA's base chief in Istanbul, Alan Taylor, a generation younger than himself, and Anna Barnes, younger still, just out of Harvard's program in Ottoman history.
Ignatius has an exciting story in Siro, but the most original feature of this unusually good thriller is its depiction of the difference between generations of covert-action operatives. The first OSS recruits joined the CIA out of patriotism and ideological conviction; they applied what they had learned from Hitler about the danger of appeasement to the challenges of the early Cold War. The operatives of the 1950s who followed accepted the anticommunist ideology as doctrine and turned it into epic theater. For them, the game of Cold War thrust and counterthrust promised a lifetime of adrenaline rushes.
The third generation, a product of the '60s and '70s and represented here by Anna Barnes, was schooled to see the world in terms of personal — not superpower — politics. At first a refreshing change from the ideological obsessions of the older generations embodied by Stone and Taylor, Barnes soon seems even more adrift than they. She thinks she is a feminist, but for her, feminism simply means that she is entitled to whatever she wants, whenever she wants it: The CIA exists to give female yuppies such as herself a chance to have the kind of glamorous careers once reserved for men. The older agents are locked into outmoded superpower myths, but the younger ones are so obsessed with personal politics they are unable to feel the tug of loyalty to anything except their own careers.
In an entertaining way, Ignatius poses a question we will be pondering for a long time: The Soviet Union certainly seems to be falling apart, but did the West's anti-Soviet policies — even ones better conceived than the sneaky-dumb CIA operation in Siro — have anything to do with it?
# Siro by David Igntiua
David Ignatius
Reviewed by Richard Gid Powers | May 10, 1991
Ignatius is of Armenian descent with ancestors from Harput, Elazığ, Turkey.[1:][2:] Ignatius's father, Paul Robert Ignatius, is a former Secretary of the Navy and president of The Washington Post.
Ignatius was raised in Washington, D.C., where he attended St. Albans School. He then attended Harvard College, where he was an editor of the Harvard Crimson and from which he graduated magna cum laude in 1973. After college, he was awarded a Frank Knox Fellowship by Harvard and studied at King's College, Cambridge, where he received a diploma in economics. He is married to Dr. Eve Thornberg Ignatius, with whom he has three daughters
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
rom the American Century to the Organization Man to the Me Generation, David Ignatius' spy thriller, Siro, charts the rise and fall of the CIA through three generations of its agents. The title comes from a State Department code word for the agency, which, in a typically caustic sentence from the novel, is described as sounding ''like the beginning of something interesting, like 'seraglio' or 'sirocco' but in fact meant nothing at all.''
Ignatius, the foreign editor of The Washington Post, has an insider's grasp of recent world crises and an unusual talent for inserting CIA operatives into those events. His excellent first novel, Agents of Innocence (1987), described the meltdown of Lebanon during the early '70s. This time the setting is 1979 on the Soviet-Turkish border, where Moslem nationalism — encouraged by a rogue CIA campaign-has begun to shake the Soviet Union.
Edward Stone, the man behind the plot, is a member of the CIA's founding old guard of OSS veterans (with more than a soup-on-the-tie resemblance to William Casey). Stone is frustrated that the Carter-era CIA is missing out on a chance to deliver a knockout punch to the Soviet Union. To set the East ablaze he picks two operatives: the CIA's base chief in Istanbul, Alan Taylor, a generation younger than himself, and Anna Barnes, younger still, just out of Harvard's program in Ottoman history.
Ignatius has an exciting story in Siro, but the most original feature of this unusually good thriller is its depiction of the difference between generations of covert-action operatives. The first OSS recruits joined the CIA out of patriotism and ideological conviction; they applied what they had learned from Hitler about the danger of appeasement to the challenges of the early Cold War. The operatives of the 1950s who followed accepted the anticommunist ideology as doctrine and turned it into epic theater. For them, the game of Cold War thrust and counterthrust promised a lifetime of adrenaline rushes.
The third generation, a product of the '60s and '70s and represented here by Anna Barnes, was schooled to see the world in terms of personal — not superpower — politics. At first a refreshing change from the ideological obsessions of the older generations embodied by Stone and Taylor, Barnes soon seems even more adrift than they. She thinks she is a feminist, but for her, feminism simply means that she is entitled to whatever she wants, whenever she wants it: The CIA exists to give female yuppies such as herself a chance to have the kind of glamorous careers once reserved for men. The older agents are locked into outmoded superpower myths, but the younger ones are so obsessed with personal politics they are unable to feel the tug of loyalty to anything except their own careers.
In an entertaining way, Ignatius poses a question we will be pondering for a long time: The Soviet Union certainly seems to be falling apart, but did the West's anti-Soviet policies — even ones better conceived than the sneaky-dumb CIA operation in Siro — have anything to do with it?
May 8, 2014
What a terrific author! I loved this book! It started good and just got better & better. By the last third, I just didn't want to put it down. I thought about the story when I wasn't reading. To me, that's the mark of a very good book. I intend to read everything Ignatius writes!
April 9, 2025
I like David Ignatius's take on spy fiction.
Ignatius is a respected Washing Post columnist and all-around smart guy. He has a detailed, journalist's knowledge of the processes and players that comprise the global intelligence establishment. He uses his knowledge to craft detailed, realistic spy fiction reminiscent of John le Carré. These are the kind of novels in which a protagonist stays in a flashy hotel, drives a flashy car, and lives a grand life - while in cover. Then the poor sap has to return to Virginia, drive to Langley in a Corolla, and fill out expense reports.
I am here for it. I like spy thrillers. I like big stories about saving the world. But I also like novels like this, about a secret little operation for relatively small stakes in a part of the world I know little about. This is a nuts 'n bolts kind of spy story, with characters who seem like the kind of people you'd run into in suburban DC. Supermen and superwomen infiltrating island fortresses is a good time and all, but I'll favor an Ignatius novel any time.
That said, this early work features all hallmarks of an Ignatius novel. It's a grounded adventure set in a time - the late Cold War - one can easily imagine. Its characters are both realistic and memorable. Its ambiguity derives from a present-day sense that maybe the whole enterprise on which our heroes have embarked was a bad idea from the jump.
In other words, this is my idea of a good time.
Ignatius is a respected Washing Post columnist and all-around smart guy. He has a detailed, journalist's knowledge of the processes and players that comprise the global intelligence establishment. He uses his knowledge to craft detailed, realistic spy fiction reminiscent of John le Carré. These are the kind of novels in which a protagonist stays in a flashy hotel, drives a flashy car, and lives a grand life - while in cover. Then the poor sap has to return to Virginia, drive to Langley in a Corolla, and fill out expense reports.
I am here for it. I like spy thrillers. I like big stories about saving the world. But I also like novels like this, about a secret little operation for relatively small stakes in a part of the world I know little about. This is a nuts 'n bolts kind of spy story, with characters who seem like the kind of people you'd run into in suburban DC. Supermen and superwomen infiltrating island fortresses is a good time and all, but I'll favor an Ignatius novel any time.
That said, this early work features all hallmarks of an Ignatius novel. It's a grounded adventure set in a time - the late Cold War - one can easily imagine. Its characters are both realistic and memorable. Its ambiguity derives from a present-day sense that maybe the whole enterprise on which our heroes have embarked was a bad idea from the jump.
In other words, this is my idea of a good time.
December 26, 2014
This story follows Anna Barnes through her graduation from CIA training in a rundown motel room in Arlington where she'd been trained alone / a class-of-one; to her first assignment which begins with an informer claiming to have knowledge of an assignation plot against the President of the United States and leads her from her NOC (Non Official Cover) post in London to Turkey and then to Rockville MD, and eventually through Russia to the off-limit Armenian borderland near Mt Arat; and finally, her subsequent dismissal/resignation from the agency.
This short-lived career of Anna Barnes is a study in where and how the "Old Gods" of the CIA go wrong and whether a new cohort can be persuaded to take another path, or whether they will as Anna does here emulate the old guard and burn out hard and fast.
In this vein, the character of Anna's aunt/family friend Margaret Houghton is an effective character both being a seed in Anna's initial attraction to the agency - "her mysterious Aunt Margaret who worked up river and brought exotic gifts" - and also in a way a symbol of everything Anna's adult self entering the service doesn't want to be - a woman agent. Her aunt is described in these uncharitable terms: "Margaret was a trailblazer, yes. But she had worked mostly at headquarters, mostly in administration . . . When she finally made station chief, it was in one of those nondescript little countries of Western Europe where the biggest threat to national security was that somebody might steal the secret recipe for making the national brand of cheese." And with this characterization of Margaret, Anna blows off all of her advice on the strengths of women in service and how to play into those, as well as disregarding her warnings about the Old Gods and their dying empire: "But that is not the way the business works. Not unless you're a Nazi."
I do really love that ultimately when Anna is deep doo-doo, it's Aunt Margaret who saves the day. And that when Anna has "gone to seed" back in the dead world that is academia, hiding from her recent tragic experience, it's Aunt Margaret who hunts her down and tries to get her to give it a go again, telling her that now she'd actually make a good agent, whereas before she was a disaster waiting to happen . . .
Aunt Margaret reminds me of a Medical Anthropology Professor (she'd been a stand-in for Margaret Mead back in the day) I had as an undergraduate who lectured over at the medical school as well (and had for decades). One day she told our class that she'd devised a very simple solution to stop sexual harassment at the medical school. The female students had learned quickly that they could confide in her when the male professors were hitting on them and she'd take their wives aside at the next cocktail party she attended and tell them. The harassment would stop the very next day. No need for mock or real legal proceedings in or outside of the school. My younger self, thought this was anti-feminist somehow, and terrible - she should have had them take it to whatever committee dealt with that. My older self thinks it's gutsy and brilliant. For whatever reason, I couldn't stop picturing Anna's Aunt Margaret as some sort of sister-in-spirit to this other woman.
Anna's sex life is also interesting to follow and mirrors the desires, tensions, and swings from one extreme to another, that this character is going through in her life at large. I'm not sure exactly how he does it, but in this book and the others of his I've read where there are sex scenes, Ignatius always manages to pull them off without irritating me, no matter how far the character's actions are from what I would like to happen in my own life. I'm not a total prude (I think, I hope), but sometimes male writers description of sexuality, and female sexuality in particular, bugs me a lot and I feel like "Yeah - you can tell a man wrote this. Grrr." So, even though I can't describe the hows or whys that make this book seems different to me, I think it's worth mentioning here anyway. Perhaps other female readers might feel the same way? [For a counter example, the sex scenes in Orhan Pamuk's Snow bothered me. And I thought, "Yes, you can tell a man wrote this. Grrr."]
Having spent a fair bit of time in Turkey myself, the descriptions in this book were both accurate even given the passage of time since this narrative is playing out in 1979 and not the period I'm familiar with (2005-2014)[examples: "virginity" discussion, locations like Topkapi Palace and Polonezkoy ring true]; and enlightening ["the only Americans likely to be stumbling around Kadikoy on a weekday afternoon were drug dealers or spies." Might be true, but I had no idea! This line is especially funny for me since I had a friend who used to live in this neighborhood. Whoops. Haha.] In short, Ignatius knows his stuff.
This book is a richly written thriller with enough characters and places to hold one's interest, but not so many that the narrative becomes confusing or shallow at any point.
The book is also so well researched that there are enticing little gems of knowledge sprinkled throughout that made me want to look up some nonfiction books after I'd finished reading it. [For example, (1)the idea that Moscow is a vast Skinner box that is rigged to condition the behavior of foreigners and Soviet citizens alike; (2) that the KGB is running the mosques; (3) the network of the Young Turks; and (4) that Byzantium is the place where spying was practically invented and that at one time half the population was employed to spy on the other half.
Overall a great read, I highly recommend it!
As far as future work of his goes, I'd be really interested in seeing another novel with Margaret as a central character (or someone like her). Anna (poor Anna!) not sure, or not so much - felt like her story had concluded, though I suppose if we were to visit her 20 years later she might have by that time grappled with her big mistake and turned into another sort of interesting character with all kinds of other troubles to face . . . so maybe.
This short-lived career of Anna Barnes is a study in where and how the "Old Gods" of the CIA go wrong and whether a new cohort can be persuaded to take another path, or whether they will as Anna does here emulate the old guard and burn out hard and fast.
In this vein, the character of Anna's aunt/family friend Margaret Houghton is an effective character both being a seed in Anna's initial attraction to the agency - "her mysterious Aunt Margaret who worked up river and brought exotic gifts" - and also in a way a symbol of everything Anna's adult self entering the service doesn't want to be - a woman agent. Her aunt is described in these uncharitable terms: "Margaret was a trailblazer, yes. But she had worked mostly at headquarters, mostly in administration . . . When she finally made station chief, it was in one of those nondescript little countries of Western Europe where the biggest threat to national security was that somebody might steal the secret recipe for making the national brand of cheese." And with this characterization of Margaret, Anna blows off all of her advice on the strengths of women in service and how to play into those, as well as disregarding her warnings about the Old Gods and their dying empire: "But that is not the way the business works. Not unless you're a Nazi."
I do really love that ultimately when Anna is deep doo-doo, it's Aunt Margaret who saves the day. And that when Anna has "gone to seed" back in the dead world that is academia, hiding from her recent tragic experience, it's Aunt Margaret who hunts her down and tries to get her to give it a go again, telling her that now she'd actually make a good agent, whereas before she was a disaster waiting to happen . . .
Aunt Margaret reminds me of a Medical Anthropology Professor (she'd been a stand-in for Margaret Mead back in the day) I had as an undergraduate who lectured over at the medical school as well (and had for decades). One day she told our class that she'd devised a very simple solution to stop sexual harassment at the medical school. The female students had learned quickly that they could confide in her when the male professors were hitting on them and she'd take their wives aside at the next cocktail party she attended and tell them. The harassment would stop the very next day. No need for mock or real legal proceedings in or outside of the school. My younger self, thought this was anti-feminist somehow, and terrible - she should have had them take it to whatever committee dealt with that. My older self thinks it's gutsy and brilliant. For whatever reason, I couldn't stop picturing Anna's Aunt Margaret as some sort of sister-in-spirit to this other woman.
Anna's sex life is also interesting to follow and mirrors the desires, tensions, and swings from one extreme to another, that this character is going through in her life at large. I'm not sure exactly how he does it, but in this book and the others of his I've read where there are sex scenes, Ignatius always manages to pull them off without irritating me, no matter how far the character's actions are from what I would like to happen in my own life. I'm not a total prude (I think, I hope), but sometimes male writers description of sexuality, and female sexuality in particular, bugs me a lot and I feel like "Yeah - you can tell a man wrote this. Grrr." So, even though I can't describe the hows or whys that make this book seems different to me, I think it's worth mentioning here anyway. Perhaps other female readers might feel the same way? [For a counter example, the sex scenes in Orhan Pamuk's Snow bothered me. And I thought, "Yes, you can tell a man wrote this. Grrr."]
Having spent a fair bit of time in Turkey myself, the descriptions in this book were both accurate even given the passage of time since this narrative is playing out in 1979 and not the period I'm familiar with (2005-2014)[examples: "virginity" discussion, locations like Topkapi Palace and Polonezkoy ring true]; and enlightening ["the only Americans likely to be stumbling around Kadikoy on a weekday afternoon were drug dealers or spies." Might be true, but I had no idea! This line is especially funny for me since I had a friend who used to live in this neighborhood. Whoops. Haha.] In short, Ignatius knows his stuff.
This book is a richly written thriller with enough characters and places to hold one's interest, but not so many that the narrative becomes confusing or shallow at any point.
The book is also so well researched that there are enticing little gems of knowledge sprinkled throughout that made me want to look up some nonfiction books after I'd finished reading it. [For example, (1)the idea that Moscow is a vast Skinner box that is rigged to condition the behavior of foreigners and Soviet citizens alike; (2) that the KGB is running the mosques; (3) the network of the Young Turks; and (4) that Byzantium is the place where spying was practically invented and that at one time half the population was employed to spy on the other half.
Overall a great read, I highly recommend it!
As far as future work of his goes, I'd be really interested in seeing another novel with Margaret as a central character (or someone like her). Anna (poor Anna!) not sure, or not so much - felt like her story had concluded, though I suppose if we were to visit her 20 years later she might have by that time grappled with her big mistake and turned into another sort of interesting character with all kinds of other troubles to face . . . so maybe.
August 8, 2022
This was probably the best espionage novel I’ve read by someone not writing under the name Le Carre. Relatively realistic, constantly interesting (though Ignatius loves history more than I do). There’s a bit of an overused trope here where someone makes incomprehensible decisions at the climax, but Ignatius does something different with it. There were a couple of things I hated in this novel (gratuitous nonsense and masculine myths about sex that authors love to propagate; both terribly out of place in this kind of novel) but those things withstanding this is exactly the kind of spy novel I love.
Action is boring. How many times have I shouted at the page (or the screen) “Too much shooting, not enough talking!”
In all seriousness this was a page turner for me, and I will definitely be reading more Ignatius.
Action is boring. How many times have I shouted at the page (or the screen) “Too much shooting, not enough talking!”
In all seriousness this was a page turner for me, and I will definitely be reading more Ignatius.
July 12, 2017
This is my first Ignatius book. This book takes 465 pages to go nowhere. The author puts a core group of characters together. They do a few things. Then the author introduces a new character. They do a few things. Then the author introduces a new character. They do a few things.
By the time its over, you don't really like any of the characters. I didn't even like the story for the last 400 pages. (Why read it? I saw where Jeff Sessions mentioned his name. I like to try new authors.)
This is a well written shell, with no core.
By the time its over, you don't really like any of the characters. I didn't even like the story for the last 400 pages. (Why read it? I saw where Jeff Sessions mentioned his name. I like to try new authors.)
This is a well written shell, with no core.
November 14, 2024
“Don’t try to beat them. It’s impossible.” Three CIA agents at very different stages of their careers engineer a wheeze to strengthen the myth of the CIA and thereby destabilise Moscow. This being 1979 things are complicated – when aren’t they? – but in David Ignatius we have an excellent guide.
“Siro” is a great read, a finely detailed depiction of humdrum spy tradecraft which is never less than gripping and terrifying in how consequential it all is. One reads “Siro” thinking how simultaneously boring and scary such work must be and by coincidence it probably helped that I’m currently watching the French TV series “The Bureau” which is similarly as far from Bond as it is possible to get and an illustration that on the ground, in the cities, not much has changed. The good news here however is that while the bulk of the work Anna and Taylor embark on is a series of meetings with very dubious types in assorted hotel rooms and bars which could of course be as dry as toast Ignatius has a real knack for great characters to keep us hooked. We follow puppyishly enthusiastic new recruit Anna Barnes – haunted by her Father and noticeably vulnerable when it comes to men and sex – going on a moral journey of her own, the more experienced and nihilistic Alan Taylor who doesn’t have any of the moral qualms Anna has and Edward Stone, an eminence grise pulling the strings who wants to see a return to the good old days of the CIA and who is slippery as an eel. Together they embark on pulling off essentially a magic trick which, in the context of the Russian invasion of Afghanistan starts to look increasingly reckless. Throughout, Ignatius manages to be personal and political at the same time – this is no mere vector for the author’s erudition or unpublished journalism, everything is in service of the story – and he even throws in some Ottoman history as a counterpoint to all the shenanigans, a reminder that the more things change the more they stay the same. It’s a great performance.
Spy novels such as “Siro” inevitably get reviewed in the context of Le Carre but he and Ignatius are very different beasts. Le Carre always reached – pretentiously and long-windedly, some might say – for a sense of literariness in his writing while Ignatius, whose prose is perfectly fine (his description of Istanbul will make you want to visit), is no stylist at the sentence level. His writing gets out of the way of his material. Arguably Ignatius has better contacts than Le Carre thanks to his day job on the Washington Post and in terms of material Ignatius seems to pick up where Le Carre left off after the Cold War, “Siro” has the same sense of “inside baseball” as “The Spy Who Came In From The Cold” and “Tinker Tailor”. Finally, both writers are very specific products of their environments. Le Carre is good on English class politics and comes with a sense of auteurship, the working out of distant personal issues. Ignatius, in “Siro” at least, doesn’t have this which makes him a bit more accessible but less intriguing as a writer. Both men are primo storytellers and while no great devotee of airport novels, albeit very well written ones, I finished “Siro” eager to get going on the rest of Ignatius’ oeuvre.
Better informed historians of the geopolitics of late seventies and early eighties than I will no doubt have a take on the aims of the people network depicted by Ignatius here and one notes with interest his emphasis in the end note that the whole thing is a work of fiction. Be that as it may but my discovery that Ignatius – a journalist still very much engaged in the zeitgeist – is not only a whip-smart and experienced correspondent for the Washington Post but also, damn him, rather good at the whole novel-writing business is at least some consolation after the wretched political events of 2024. “Pain is timeless.”
“Siro” is a great read, a finely detailed depiction of humdrum spy tradecraft which is never less than gripping and terrifying in how consequential it all is. One reads “Siro” thinking how simultaneously boring and scary such work must be and by coincidence it probably helped that I’m currently watching the French TV series “The Bureau” which is similarly as far from Bond as it is possible to get and an illustration that on the ground, in the cities, not much has changed. The good news here however is that while the bulk of the work Anna and Taylor embark on is a series of meetings with very dubious types in assorted hotel rooms and bars which could of course be as dry as toast Ignatius has a real knack for great characters to keep us hooked. We follow puppyishly enthusiastic new recruit Anna Barnes – haunted by her Father and noticeably vulnerable when it comes to men and sex – going on a moral journey of her own, the more experienced and nihilistic Alan Taylor who doesn’t have any of the moral qualms Anna has and Edward Stone, an eminence grise pulling the strings who wants to see a return to the good old days of the CIA and who is slippery as an eel. Together they embark on pulling off essentially a magic trick which, in the context of the Russian invasion of Afghanistan starts to look increasingly reckless. Throughout, Ignatius manages to be personal and political at the same time – this is no mere vector for the author’s erudition or unpublished journalism, everything is in service of the story – and he even throws in some Ottoman history as a counterpoint to all the shenanigans, a reminder that the more things change the more they stay the same. It’s a great performance.
Spy novels such as “Siro” inevitably get reviewed in the context of Le Carre but he and Ignatius are very different beasts. Le Carre always reached – pretentiously and long-windedly, some might say – for a sense of literariness in his writing while Ignatius, whose prose is perfectly fine (his description of Istanbul will make you want to visit), is no stylist at the sentence level. His writing gets out of the way of his material. Arguably Ignatius has better contacts than Le Carre thanks to his day job on the Washington Post and in terms of material Ignatius seems to pick up where Le Carre left off after the Cold War, “Siro” has the same sense of “inside baseball” as “The Spy Who Came In From The Cold” and “Tinker Tailor”. Finally, both writers are very specific products of their environments. Le Carre is good on English class politics and comes with a sense of auteurship, the working out of distant personal issues. Ignatius, in “Siro” at least, doesn’t have this which makes him a bit more accessible but less intriguing as a writer. Both men are primo storytellers and while no great devotee of airport novels, albeit very well written ones, I finished “Siro” eager to get going on the rest of Ignatius’ oeuvre.
Better informed historians of the geopolitics of late seventies and early eighties than I will no doubt have a take on the aims of the people network depicted by Ignatius here and one notes with interest his emphasis in the end note that the whole thing is a work of fiction. Be that as it may but my discovery that Ignatius – a journalist still very much engaged in the zeitgeist – is not only a whip-smart and experienced correspondent for the Washington Post but also, damn him, rather good at the whole novel-writing business is at least some consolation after the wretched political events of 2024. “Pain is timeless.”
May 17, 2023
This started very well - nicely observed, intelligent, quite witty, an old-fashioned spy thriller with a refreshing absence of the sort of Jason Bourne-esque gunplay and knuckle-bound machismo that plagues the modern version of this genre.
Unfortunately as the female lead, Anna, started to take centre stage, things began to go downhill for me. The main reason is that the author decided that what was needed was a "love story" complete with a lot of vaguely wince-inducing bad sex scenes. What started as a sort of zesty Le Carré, started to turn into some kind of Jackie Collins novel in the middle third. Except written by a man who, one suspects, learned what little he knows about female sexuality from a Jackie Collins novel.
It also felt a bit sexist for me, although maybe I'm being sexist by thinking it's sexist? Why, for instance, are the two main male characters these Bond-lite raffish wordly men who can put their emotions to one side to get the job done, but Anna is seemingly incapable of keeping her emotions in check and is one minute "missing [Alan Taylor] terribly", the next "aching to be with [Aram]" - to the extent that her decision making becomes seriously compromised. Indeed (SPOLIER ALERT) her madcap adventure at the end which winds up with her in a KGB prison cell is basically because she has fallen in love with her Armenian contact? And when she's come through the whole thing she demonstrates her "strength" right at the end by witholding her affection from the advances of the other CIA agent Alan, thereby showing she's "toughened up". The whole thing felt very women-as-seen-through-the-lens-of-a-middle-aged-man.
Anyway, it was readable enough and well-written from a stylistic point of view, but not I think a classic.
Unfortunately as the female lead, Anna, started to take centre stage, things began to go downhill for me. The main reason is that the author decided that what was needed was a "love story" complete with a lot of vaguely wince-inducing bad sex scenes. What started as a sort of zesty Le Carré, started to turn into some kind of Jackie Collins novel in the middle third. Except written by a man who, one suspects, learned what little he knows about female sexuality from a Jackie Collins novel.
It also felt a bit sexist for me, although maybe I'm being sexist by thinking it's sexist? Why, for instance, are the two main male characters these Bond-lite raffish wordly men who can put their emotions to one side to get the job done, but Anna is seemingly incapable of keeping her emotions in check and is one minute "missing [Alan Taylor] terribly", the next "aching to be with [Aram]" - to the extent that her decision making becomes seriously compromised. Indeed (SPOLIER ALERT) her madcap adventure at the end which winds up with her in a KGB prison cell is basically because she has fallen in love with her Armenian contact? And when she's come through the whole thing she demonstrates her "strength" right at the end by witholding her affection from the advances of the other CIA agent Alan, thereby showing she's "toughened up". The whole thing felt very women-as-seen-through-the-lens-of-a-middle-aged-man.
Anyway, it was readable enough and well-written from a stylistic point of view, but not I think a classic.
September 11, 2017
This is very much like Ignatius's other books that I've read. It's full of intrigue, not action. I've never been involved in the world of espionage, but this feels believable and realistic in a way that James Bond and Hollywood never do.
I think this book surpasses other Ignatius works I've read in the realm of character depiction and development. The characters are very well-developed, nuanced, and dynamic. You will feel different about each of the main characters at the end than you do at the beginning, yet the way they make the transitions are very natural and believable. As with other Ignatius books, this book is permeated with moral ambiguity. The different characters reflect realistic disagreement between intelligent people about what the most desirable "ends" are, and each character makes a series of judgment calls about which "means" are and aren't acceptable to reach those ends.
I think this book surpasses other Ignatius works I've read in the realm of character depiction and development. The characters are very well-developed, nuanced, and dynamic. You will feel different about each of the main characters at the end than you do at the beginning, yet the way they make the transitions are very natural and believable. As with other Ignatius books, this book is permeated with moral ambiguity. The different characters reflect realistic disagreement between intelligent people about what the most desirable "ends" are, and each character makes a series of judgment calls about which "means" are and aren't acceptable to reach those ends.
July 10, 2017
For a spy novel fan "Siro" is as good as it gets; and I must say that I enjoyed the in depth analysis of other reviewers. I got caught up in plot and character development that kept me turning pages (actually, flipping screens) and didn't reflect on the devolutionary nature of the organization which was under (and undermining) the characters and plot and which contributed to both. Reflecting now on the state of the intelligence community and law enforcement and their diminution by the present administration, I appreciated the insights the author provided into the conflicting forces at work--ideological, economic, and political. I am appalled at the current president's raising doubts about the intelligence community's integrity and commitment to defense of the Constitution.
September 24, 2020
Siro disappoints not just because of the mediocre literary quality, but because it is totally misrepresented as a spy thriller. It's actually a poorly-written romance novel with stereotyped, uninteresting characters. Mr. Ignatius' madonna-whore fantasy is that an aristocratic feminist remakes the pathetic old-boys' CIA.
From his reportorial career, Ignatius apparently learned little about espionage, the agencies, world politics, and least of all women. His orthodox, what-me-worry insights into the pre-collapse Soviet Union and post-colonial Middle East on which Siro's plot depends were shown to be bogus just a year after publication with the first Islamist attack on the Towers.
From his reportorial career, Ignatius apparently learned little about espionage, the agencies, world politics, and least of all women. His orthodox, what-me-worry insights into the pre-collapse Soviet Union and post-colonial Middle East on which Siro's plot depends were shown to be bogus just a year after publication with the first Islamist attack on the Towers.
July 26, 2023
This is a very old book. My copy was given to me by one of my dearest friends on the planet. We used to trade books regularly but when she gave me this one she said I would really enjoy it. Twenty-plus years later, I’m here to say she was right. This is a Cold War espionage tale written before there were computers and cell phones; it took me back to the early years of my career. Ignatius developed his characters as well as he developed his crazy plot. Didn’t matter that some of it was far fetched. It kept you guessing and turning the pages. Maybe Netflix should do a movie version—it could compete with The Night Agent.
April 7, 2020
Maybe his best
Neither the characters nor the events were dinky. All rang true. The people were "human" some of whom struggled with recognisable questions of morality while others were to cynical or hardened to even consider them. The sexual tension was classy & satisfied. All the actors played well together as they crossed the world plotting nefarious deeds. Solve succeeded, some fell apart, no one was a super wo/man. All had classy feet. A thoroughly enjoyed romp in the shadows of the CIA.
Neither the characters nor the events were dinky. All rang true. The people were "human" some of whom struggled with recognisable questions of morality while others were to cynical or hardened to even consider them. The sexual tension was classy & satisfied. All the actors played well together as they crossed the world plotting nefarious deeds. Solve succeeded, some fell apart, no one was a super wo/man. All had classy feet. A thoroughly enjoyed romp in the shadows of the CIA.
November 14, 2019
A great espionage novel doesn’t need bombs and bullets to capture your interest. Consider the highly intelligent novels written by journalist David Ignatius, which are based on battles of wit, wisdom, deception and trade-craft. SIRO is centered on a rookie female case officer, operating in Soviet satellite states in 1979. The book remains as relevant today as when it was written in 1991, underscoring the strength of Ignatus’ writing.
August 2, 2022
Outstanding. I’ve read seven of his books and this really was a cracker. I almost never give 5*.
As usual the characterisations were intricate and believable and the plot was really involving. It was very well researched and crammed with interesting detail about a region of the world that is not well known or understood.
The others which I enjoyed by David are Blood Money, Paladin, The Director, The Increment, The Quantum Spy and Fifty Fifty.
As usual the characterisations were intricate and believable and the plot was really involving. It was very well researched and crammed with interesting detail about a region of the world that is not well known or understood.
The others which I enjoyed by David are Blood Money, Paladin, The Director, The Increment, The Quantum Spy and Fifty Fifty.
July 7, 2019
What can I say, I know the author. The book was okay to read, but it was never a page turner. And for my taste way too much CIA. Got it because I am running out of books and I got what I expected. 2.5 stars.
July 21, 2020
The bare bones of a good story here. But far too many tedious digressions into the history of the Ottoman Empire. For me, these digressions brought the development of the plot to a juddering halt. It was a frustrating read and never really got going.
October 11, 2020
Fell short of my expectations. The storyline seemed improbable, the characters not believable. While David Ignatius is a great fiction writer, this book, a seemingly insiders view of NOC CIA spies lacked the plot and the characters that I would have liked..
March 11, 2023
The Degaussed Moral Compass
What we all know in our bones may enkindle right passion but the actions that follow miss the mark, like a ship steering by compass
alone ignoring the Sun's line and the Glass while the weather seems fair.
What we all know in our bones may enkindle right passion but the actions that follow miss the mark, like a ship steering by compass
alone ignoring the Sun's line and the Glass while the weather seems fair.
December 31, 2017
It was pretty good. I had to return it to the library and take it out later.
March 2, 2018
High quality writing coupled with an excellent plot, good character development, and, again, high quality writing. This is my first Ignatius novel and I’m looking forward to my second!
July 28, 2018
much better than his first book
February 17, 2019
A stunner
One of the best spy novels i have read in recent times. It is so cleverly researched and well written that it is hard to believe it is a work of fiction
One of the best spy novels i have read in recent times. It is so cleverly researched and well written that it is hard to believe it is a work of fiction
May 28, 2019
Enjoyable - not his best though!
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