She was in banking, IIRC.
She felt to me like total flobotanum -- Bourne's shadowy past could be sussed out if he only had the assistance of someone who knows international banking inside and out, if only -- why, hel-LO, Marie!
It may also be that I'm ruined for spy novels by having started out with Le Carré, lord and king and master and commander of the angsty spy novel (TM Nutty), and I probably shouldn't have read
Bourne
quite so immediately after
The Spy Who Came In From The Cold,
as it was bound to suffer in comparison. I should have waited a bit, say, two or three years.
t /serious Ludlum issues
Ludlum's more pulpy. There are many people in Le Carré's league. Graham Greene, perhaps?
Graham Greene is so infinitely better than Ludlum. Though he doesn't really inhabit the "spy novel" portion of my bookbrain.
Though he doesn't really inhabit the "spy novel" portion of my bookbrain.
I got to him through Our Man in Havana, so he does for me. Ludlum is more in a class with Fleming, though I think I like Fleming better.
I liked Frederick Forsyth's "The Fourth Protocol", which was made into a so-so movie with Pierce Brosnan.
Fleming at least is brief. OTOH, Ludlum's personal angst is a little bit camouflaged by the fact he is so lengthy.
I liked Ludlum; he got me through highschool; but as with a lot of my highschool reading I can't bear to read it now I'm no longer in highschool.
Ludlum and Tom Clancy and Helen McInnes were also my high school friends. And Sidney Sheldon. Man, what taste I had. At the time, however, I remember Ludlum's "funny" books actually being funny, and damn he was prolific.
The Fourth Protocol (movie version) also had Joanna Cassidy and Michael Caine, so I rather liked it, even though it did involve an awful lot of running around on Caine's part.
I love Movie!Bourne. He's all woobieful and etched with pain, but he doesn't burble about it; he just shoots the shit out of people and snaps their neck and stuff, and then he looks broken some more, occasionally in shirts that show off some arm. That's good enough for me.
And he runs! Properly! Like a military man! All economy and power and...
I'll be in my bunk.
(I swear, I'm the only one I know who gets hot'n'bothered over movie characters running. Daniel Craig's running in Casino Royale? Dreamy as hell.)
I get hot and bothered over JRM's running in
Bend It Like Beckham,
but that's a whole 'nother kettle of vibe.
