Bob Howard is a com­pu­ta­tion­al de­mo­nolo­gist who works for the occult British spy agency informally known as the Laundry. He’s a computer hacker who’s starting to get some field experience, but nobody would confuse him with a suave la­dykilling man of action. A bil­lion­aire is intent upon raising an eldritch horror from the depths of the sea. Only Bob, who has been “destiny entangled” with a sultry American operative, can stop him. Bob is the last to realize that Ellis Billington has protected himself with a geas, casting himself as a Bond villain re-enacting Thun­der­ball, and that Bob—and only Bob—has to step into the Bond role.

Stross has a lot of fun with the Bond tropes and he pulls it off. Rec­om­mend­ed.

Sequel to The Atrocity Archives. More at Charlie Stross’s Crib Sheet and the Laundry Files Wiki.