Spy Thrillers to Read Before the New James Bond Movie

Spy Thrillers to Read Before the New James Bond Movie

The new James Bond movie, No Time to Die, is out this October. Maybe you’re eagerly awaiting the movie, or maybe you’ve already seen it; either way, if you’re in the mood for more action-packed fun, there are a whole lot of fantastic spy thrillers to choose from. We’ve put together a list of chilling, twisty, surprising novels perfect for any James Bond fan, from classic 1960s espionage stories to modern-day techno thrillers. So get out the popcorn, put your feet up, and get ready to celebrate No Time to Die 2021 with these six James Bond read-alikes.

 

Geiger is full of every twist and turn you could possibly want from a spy thriller, along with fantastic character development and a vivid setting. The story begins with a phone call. Agneta picks up the receiver and hears only one word: geiger. She knows what it means, and proceeds to silently murder her husband, and then disappear. Detective Sara Nowak isn’t assigned to this particular case, but she has ties to the people affected, so she joins the investigation. Soon she’s caught up in a dangerous and decades-old plot.

 

Killing Eve: Die for Me is the third installment in Luke Jennings’s thrilling espionage series. The story follows two highly skilled and deadly spies, adversaries whose mutual infatuation with each other puts them in danger again and again. Villanelle is one of the world’s most sought-after and ruthless assassins. Eve Polastri is an accomplished spy. As the two women circle each other in a twisty game of cat-and-mouse, romantic obsession collides with high-stakes action.

 

In The Spy’s Daughter, the tense and unpredictable third novel in Adam Brookes’s Philip Mangan series, a teenage tech prodigy struggles for control of her own life. Nineteen-year-old Pearl Tao just wants a normal teenage life, full of friends and parties. But her gift for math has always set her apart. When a mysterious technology cooperation offers her a college scholarship, she realizes that her overprotective parents have had a plan for her all along, and it’s terrifying. Desperate to escape the net she’s caught in, she turns to two down-and-out spies for help.

Hannah’s war is a breathtaking reimagining of the end of World War II. In Germany in 1938, Hannah Weiss, a brilliant Jewish physicist, is on the cusp of splitting the atom, a scientific breakthrough she knows will have the power to change the world. But her research is eventually stolen by the Nazi government, and Hannah is forced to make an impossible choice. In New Mexico in 1945, Jack Delaney returns from the war in Europe with only one goal: to catch the spy who’s been leaking information to the Nazis. He’s certain that Hannah is responsible, but when he begins to question her, he realizes that her story is much more complicated than he ever imagined. This beautifully layered novel explores love, loyalty, and the unforeseen consequences of even the smallest actions.

If you’re looking for a fast-paced spy thriller with all the trappings—1960s setting, global conspiracies, cat-and-mouse chases, and shadowy operatives—you’re going to want to pick up Double Exposure. David Toland is a Korean War vet who’s set aside the military life in favor of pursing his true passion: film. He works for the National Film Archive at the Library of Congress, preserving his favorite work from the Golden Age of cinema. But then CIA agent Lana Welles shows up with a canister of film that may prove that World War II didn’t actually end. David reluctantly agrees to help Lana recover the film—and the secrets of the past.

Secret identities and lies-within-lies abound in The Prometheus Man. After a series of murders in Paris, CIA Agent Tom Blake gets himself assigned to the case, which involves tracking a man with superhuman abilities, the test subject of a super secret government project. There’s only one hiccup: Tom Blake is not who he says he is. He’s actually Tom Reese, a man without a home, bent on tracking down his brother’s killer. But he’s running out of time. Soon, the CIA is going to see right through his disguise, and maybe even discover things Reese doesn’t know about himself—like the fact that he, too, is the product of a mysterious government project.