Charles McCarry Talks Espionage, THE BETTER ANGELS, and a Career Celebrated and Neglected in L.A. Times Interview

In a rare interview published in The Los Angeles Times today, Charles McCarry talks about his prophetic thriller The Better Angels, first published in 1979 and now being reissued in hardcover by The Overlook Press. Scott Timberg writes: "Despite unceasing critical support and strong sales in the 1970s, McCarry's novels were available in later decades only in used bookstores. But since 2005, the Overlook Press has been gradually reissuing all his work, and this month they're publishing The Better Angels. The novel, originally published in 1979 and set in the '90s, reads like a prehistory of the Sept. 11 attacks: While most of it takes place in Washington, D.C., the book's plot is set in motion by a rabble-rousing Arab Muslim leader and a Middle Eastern terrorist who once exploded planes over Israel."