The Seventh Floor
A Novel

I can't begin to describe how much I love David McCloskey's work. His debut novel—Damascus Station— is a work of art; four years on and I think about it at least once a week. In his newest—The Seventh Floor— Artemis Proctor is on the hunt for a mole inside CIA while simultaneously blowing up her car......more

A really poor effort. The main character is a mess without any sense of substance or structure. The writing is confusing and needlessly padded. This feels like something rushed to meet contractual obligations.......more

Another disappointing spy story written by an actual former spook, (I'm thinking particularly of Valerie Plame and Karen Cleveland here). So I guess…maybe stick to books written by actual writers? I picked this up mainly for the initial "a Russian arrives in Singapore with a secret to sell" blurb, si......more

"The Seventh Floor" is a crackerjack follow-up to David McCloskey's "Moscow X", featuring main characters from his fine first two novels. It's McCloskey's spin on the ubiquitous (at least in spy fiction) 'there's a mole in a key position in our agency!' story, but he's self-aware enough to throw a c......more

"[H]e parachuted bread into the toaster";"three other friends had . . . punched their ticket to the afterlife". Random samples. If you think these are "good writing", this book will be a treat. Otherwise, be warned that, besides this sort of thing, the narrative voice is irritating American slang, l......more