Episode description

Welcome to Episode 167 of the Spybrary Spy Book podcast. Today, we bring you a spy author interview. Spybrary host Shane Whaley finds out more about How to Betray Your Country with spy writer, author James Wolff

Something I want to address with you all before we get into the conversation, the elephant in the room, James Wolff is not the author's real name. James Wolff reveals he has worked for the British government but does not reveal which branch nor where he was based.

As a Spybrarian, naturally, I'm wondering, am I speaking with a George Smiley, a Bernard Samson, maybe it's a Dickie Cruyer or 007 or maybe he was the janitor at GCHQ? He's not going to talk about his past today, but I tell you something I can share with you. The boy can write!

Things are looking bad for disgraced spy August Drummond. In emotional free fall after the death of his wife, fired for a series of unprecedented security breaches that saw him labeled a traitor...and now his neighbour on the flight to Istanbul won’t stop talking. 

The only thing keeping him sane is the hunch that there’s something not quite right about the nervous young man several rows ahead - a hunch that is confirmed when August watches him throw away directions to an old European cemetery seconds before being detained by Turkish police. And when a reckless August decides to go in his place, little does he know that he is setting in motion a series of events that will test his ingenuity and resourcefulness to the limit, and bring him face to face with a terrifying figure from the dark heart of the Islamic State.

The second novel in a trilogy about loyalty and betrayal in the modern age, How to Betray Your Country is an authentic thriller about walking the line between following your conscience and following orders.