Richard Brodick is an agent with MI6.
The time period for the trio of adventures that exist of this man is 1981 - 1992 and the locations for his activities range from Beirut, the closest to his native England, and Beijing, the farthest.
As we are told in a blurb about this operative in the beginning of the first recorded adventure, "Richard Brodick wants to do his patriotic bit in the Cold War and has set his sights on joining the Secret Intelligence Service as a full-time officer, following in the footsteps of his father's illustrious career as a World War Two spy." That his parent had also become for a time the SIS Director added to his determination to make something of himself in the clandestine world.
That sounds rather noble and honorable and it may very well be the case but when we initially meet him, in Peshawar, Pakistan, he lets us know he is seriously rethinking his career choices and doubting he would ever make it as an operative with the Secret Intelligence Service. "He'd given up his marriage, a well-paid job, his dog, and his home for a career in intelligence", he muses, because working in this new capacity "meant everything to him and he'd been willing to pay almost any price". Unfortunately, he was discovering very quickly that "the dream had turned out to be a mirage".
Of course, a good deal of that was a bad case of the nerves and as we continue to follow him, we will watch Brodick get over that, and subsequent repeat, though less, severe bouts and eventually become a trained, seasoned, and trusted agent.
One that happens, though, things begin to really get interesting (okay, they were pretty interesting already) when a slightly more seasoned albeit still quite inexperienced Brodick is put into a situation involving the extremely dangerous and seemingly ever-present Chen Meilin, workname of Fang, deputy chief of the Chinese Foreign Intelligence Service and codenamed DRAGON by MI6. What makes this woman so fascinating is that we are always a bit in the doubt about one thing. Did Brodick recruit Fang to work for him or did she recruit him?