I had been reading for some time of Olen Steinhauer as a superior writer of espionage novels. So I bought a copy of The Tourist, one of his Milo Weaver trilogy.

My perception is that there are two major strains of spy novel. One is the rah-rah thriller, in the tradition of James Bond and Jack Ryan, where the emphasis is on action but there’s little or no question who are the good guys.

The other strain is the John Le Carré school, probably more technically realistic, where the tendency is to reduce the conflict between freedom and tyranny to a game played by cynical and generally dispassionate professionals. In this kind of story it’s hard to tell one side from the other; in fact, our side generally comes off looking worse, as we get a closer look at its transgressions.

Judging by The Tourist, Olen Steinhauer seems to belong to the second group.

His hero, Milo Weaver, is a former “Tourist,” a roving professional assassin for the CIA. Now he has settled down happily with a wife and stepdaughter. Then he’s recalled to join the hunt for a famous assassin, loose in the USA. Once he catches him he learns things that lead him to question some of his most cherished relationships. Caught in a power struggle between the CIA and Homeland Security, he must take the risk of trusting an old enemy, and take the chance of losing everything that has made his life worth living.

The writing’s good, and Milo is an engaging character. But I disliked the cynicism of the story, the assumption that there’s really nothing to choose between America and any other world power. There isn’t much hope in this book. Cautions for language and mature subject matter.

Dennis Lehane, best known for superlative contemporary mysteries, takes on a historical tale in Live By Night, the story of a Boston gangster who becomes a bootlegger king in Tampa. It’s a very good novel. I’m not entirely sure what it’s about thematically, and I’m fairly sure I disagree with the subtext. Still, a worthy read.

Joe Coughlin is a cop’s son, but chooses to become a gangster (he prefers the term “outlaw”). He first sees Emma Gould while robbing an illegal poker game, and he starts dating her even though a mob boss is obsessed with her. One thing leads to another, and Joe ends up doing five years in prison while Emma ends up in a wrecked car in a river.

Joe can never forget her, though he’s sure she’s dead. In prison he gets close to a mob leader who, on his release, sends him down to Tampa to run the rum running operation there. This leads him to great wealth and success, and marriage to a beautiful Cuban woman. He tries to do his job in his own way, showing mercy to people when he can, but gradually he realizes he’s a gangster, not an outlaw. And his longing for lost Emma haunts him until he achieves at last a painful clarity.

I think author Lehane recognizes, and wants us to understand, that Joe is not without his self-delusions. The title of the book, Live By Night, is a reference to his belief that there are day people and night people, and that the night people are more glamorous and more honest, because they’re not hypocrites like the day people. This is of course a rationalization; the only choices in life aren’t between being a corrupt cop or an open criminal. One could, for instance, be a dirt farmer. The work might kill you, but you’d have small scope for corruption.

No, Joe’s real motivation is an addiction to risk-taking, and Lehane admits as much.

All in all, I suspect the real message of the book is essentially Marxist. The Americans are bad because they’re racist and rich. The Cubans, though Lehane admits they’re just as racist, are poor and therefore pure in some sense. The book ends before Castro shows up, so Communism is only addressed in an oblique way.

There is an running theme of religious aspiration, but Lehane doesn’t seem to see much hope in it.

But it’s not a heavy-handed book. Anything but. Live By Night is a well-written, moving story. Cautions for language and adult themes.