Espionage Aficionados discussion

Hi there, I really hope you can help me out I'm quite fascinated by TV shows like Rubicon, Utopia and the conspiracy part of the X-Files. The politicking part of Sicario also was quite awesome. I'm desperately looking for a book or a series that might scratch this itch. Let me give you a short rundown of what I'm looking for:

Grounded Conspiracy
What do I mean with grounded? Well, stuff like age old secret orders that have been controlling the world forever or hokey mystical stuff (e.g. "Templars guarding the Key to Immortality") is not grounded in my book. Aliens are okay but it should not be too over the top


Protagonist who are smart and combat problems with realistic methods

While chasing around the globe from one obscure art puzzle to the next is nice, I prefer pedestrian problem solving, e.g. pouring over pages and pages of reports, checking records and having lots of meetings akin to "Zero Dark Thirty"

Vague but Menacing
I'd really love it if the whole situation the protagonists are facing is vague and even faceless. Instead of Ali the Terrorist or Sergej the Super Spy as an antagonist I'd much prefer if the antagonist is just like any other machine: Lot of people just doing their work.


I know this profile is highly peculiar and very narrow but I'm ready to give anything a try.

Don't know if this is helpful, as it's not traditionally classed as a mystery, and your shelf suggests more interest in fantasy than hard SF, but how about Neal Stephenson's "Cryptonomicon"? If you make it through the first 50 pages, you may get hooked--I loved it from page one.

100% behind "Cryptonomicon" it's a great read, smart and complex, with some good WWII action mixed in.

I'm a fan of real life thrillers. Those are also the books I try to write. Cryptonomicon is very long, very dense (three time periods, three interlocking plots) and absolutely fantastic. The author Neal Stephenson is a prolific genius and, if you like this one you'll probably also like Snow Crash--a Sci-Fi book that more or less invented the Internet alongside Neuromancer and, of course, Al Gore--and Diamond Age, another futuristic Sci-Fi page-turner about nanotechnology and digital printing. All of these books deservedly won every Sci-Fi award out there, and none of them involves spacemen. Lots of conspiracies, however.

Closer to earth, R. E. McDermott's Disruption Series is set in the US in the near-future (2020 or so) in the aftermath of a giant solar flare that fries the US electricity generation and transmission grids. McDermott's background is in shipping, so you get a very deep dive on that aspect but his plotting is multi-level and fast-paced with the basic premise being a sound one. Start with Under a Tell Tale Sky. The good guys are well-drawn while the bad guys are somewhat caricatured, but it's a page turn and the successor Push Back is even better.

Laurence O'Bryan's The Istanbul Puzzle follows the search for an ancient manuscript in modern day Istanbul, with a sinister array of villains and a plausible ordinary academic as the hero. The book is particularly rich in setting and history, with more than a whiff of the occult.

Finally, I've written Sea of Lies, an Asia-based espionage thriller with the disappearance of MH370 as its central theme. You can find out more on www.bradleywest.net.

You could also try the following, which are a mix of what you're looking for.

The Hunt for Atlantis
The Heretic's Treasure

Or perhaps

Sanctus
The Key