Berk Worms Book Club: Espionage/ Spy Fiction

Welcome to the Berk Worms Book Club🐛 2025. Each month we all read the same book that we have chosen from a different genre and then meet to discuss it as well as other books we are reading.

For May, 2025, for our Spy/ Espionage genre, we have selected to read ‘Moscow X’ by David McCloskey, published in 2023. This is the second novel from the former CIA OFFICER, AND THE SUNDAY TIMES-BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF THE SEVENTH FLOOR AND THE TIMES THRILLER OF THE YEARDAMASCUS STATION. It runs at approximately 460 pages. It is available in all formats, including Kindle and Audible.

About the novel:

A daring CIA operation threatens chaos in the Kremlin.

But can Langley trust the Russian at its center?

CIA operatives Sia and Max enter Russia to recruit Vladimir Putin's moneyman. Sia works for a London firm that conceals the wealth of the super-rich. Max's family business in Mexico – a CIA front since the 1960s – is a farm that breeds high-end racehorses. They pose as a couple, and their targets are Vadim, Putin's private banker, and his wife Anna, who is both a banker and an intelligence officer herself…

About the author:

David McCloskey is a former CIA analyst and consultant at McKinsey & Company. While at the CIA, he wrote regularly for the President’s Daily Brief, delivered classified testimony to Congressional oversight committees, and briefed senior White House officials, Ambassadors, military officials, and Arab royalty. He worked in CIA field stations across the Middle East. During his time at McKinsey, David advised national security, aerospace, and transportation clients on a range of strategic and operational issues. David holds an M.A. from the Johns Hopkins School for Advanced International Studies, where he specialized in energy policy and the Middle East. He lives in Texas with his wife and three children.

Critical views:

‘The most authentic depiction of CIA deep cover operations you'll find in print' - John Sipher, Former CIA Senior Operations Officer

'A terrific read, cementing McCloskey in my mind as the best spy fiction writer since le Carré' - Nicholas Kristof, New York Times

'Spellbinding ... An electrifying read. I could not put it down' - Clarissa Ward, CNN Chief International Correspondent

Reading ahead with the BERKWORMS

**10 June: Short Stories - **‘Last Stories’ by William Trevor. Published 2018.

**8 July: Detective/ murder mystery **to be selected in our May meet up. Please send through suggestions.

Happy reading, 🐛Cazza