Our Man in Havana

James Wormold, a vacuum cleaner salesman in Havana struggling for money, is recruited by British Intelligence to work as an undercover agent. To maintain his lucrative payments, he fabricates his spy work: he deciphers codes he doesn't understand, submits sketches of secret weapons that resemble vacuum parts, and claims to have recruited operatives from his country club. When MI6 sends a secretary to oversee his activities, Wormold worries his false reports will be exposed. Instead, his invented world begins to materialize. He becomes the target of an assassin, and escaping Cuba alive requires more than deception. What started as pretense forces Wormold into actual espionage. Set during the Cold War, this novel combines satire with spy fiction conventions, exploring how fiction and reality intersect in the world of intelligence operations.