Thomas Lang is drawn into a web of intrigue as he tries to wriggle every which way to extract himself. When there is no other option, he commits himself, and now beware, said the fly to the spider. This was the audio version, read by Simon Prebble, who is superb.

I'm not sure why one review called this a "spoof of the spy genre." I thought it a good mystery story with shades of noir and lots of laughs. Romance, intrigue, humour and action, a perfect blend! I could say I was offended by the portrayal of Americans, but no. With recent events it is all too believable. Please someone, tell me Mr. Laurie is going to write another book, and preferably one with Thomas Lang in it. (Posted on 11/4/12)

Good quality. I've listened to a fair few audio books in my day, and some have obvious technical problems (especially when you can tell the transition from one recording session to another by a change in volume or the reader's voice). Hardly any of that here. Almost seamless. The reader, Simon Prebble, did a great job conveying the humor. I suspect that you'd need a British sense of timing to pull off a British humorist's writing, and Prebble certainly did well. He conjured up a number of voices and accents to portray the various characters. He really shone with the European accents. When it came to the few American accents, they all sounded the same (I suspect Prebble is British) except the one Minnesotan accent which sounded like a troop of Norwegian actors doing a recreation of the movie Fargo (i.e., I'm from America and have even lived near Minnesota and nobody there talks or sounds like that at all). Minor complaint. The audio quality was mostly stellar. (I'd have given it 4.5 out of 5 stars here, if that were even an option.) (Posted on 10/20/12)