A spy in from the cold, sort of

After years of clandestine operations throughout Europe, former Soviet spy Chingiz Abdullayev has traded in his old code names for a new moniker.

Meet "Mr. Detective."

That's what fans here of the spook-turned-scribe call Mr. Abdullayev, who emerged from the inner sanctum of the KGB to transform himself into one of the hottest novelists in the former Soviet Union.

He's sold 10 million copies of his 40-odd spy novels that have made him a wealthy man. Each book he writes now earns him more than $200,000 within two or three years, he says.

The secret to his success is simple, he says: He writes the truth.

"I write about people we tend to forget after their deaths," Abdullayev says from his cavernous office in the Azerbaijan Writers Union in downtown Baku, a city of nearly 2 million people on the western shores of the Caspian Sea. "Agents that were forgotten, agents that were betrayed."

And the person to tell the stories is his main character, known only to readers as Drongo. The name comes from a small but brave Asian bird that shows no fear to larger birds, Abdullayev says.

"He has no nationality and no real name," he says. "People in Georgia think he's Georgian, people in Russia think he's Russian, and people in Azerbaijan think he's Azeri."

Armed with a law degree, Abdullayev began working for the Soviet Defense Ministry in 1981. He says his role was in "international law," but his work was far from bookish. He was wounded twice in the line of duty. He won't discuss details.

A former KGB agent

He acknowledges he lived the life of a spy but downplays his ability.

"I think I have a complex like Arthur Conan Doyle," he says as he sips a glass of tea. "He wanted to become a detective, but he started to write books about them instead."

His decision to make writing a full-time career became clear to him after a fellow Soviet spy was double-crossed in Angola in 1983. His friend was killed by a shotgun blast to the back on an Angolan street.

In the mid-1980s, Abdullayev began to write, even though his government career continued to soar. In 1987, he returned to Azerbaijan to become the head of KGB operations in Baku's largest city district.

He finished his first novel, "Blue Angels," in 1985. It was barred from publication because of the secrets it revealed about the innerworkings of covert operations against drug smugglers.

But by 1988 the Soviet foundation began to crumble, censorship was relaxed, and his book was published. His writing became an almost overnight success and he quit the KGB a year later. His books, now published in nine languages, are not without controversy. While former Soviet citizens crave his first-hand accounts of cold-war espionage, his brash use of real characters has earned him some very real enemies.

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