Overview

THE paperback of 2014 - outstanding reviews, huge coverage, le Carre's most compelling novel in years A counter-terror operation, codenamed Wildlife, is being mounted in Britain's most precious colony, Gibraltar. Its purpose- to capture and abduct a high-value jihadist arms-buyer. Its authors- an ambitious Foreign Office Minister, and a private defence contractor who is also his close friend. So delicate is the operation that even the Minister's Private Secretary, Toby Bell, is not cleared for it. Suspecting a disastrous conspiracy, Toby attempts to forestall it, but is promptly posted overseas. Three years on, summoned by Sir Christopher Probyn, retired British diplomat, to his decaying Cornish manor house, and closely watched by Probyn's daughter Emily, Toby must choose between his conscience and his duty to the Service. If the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing, how can he keep silent?

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9780241965184

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Reviews

I think he has easily burst out of being a genre writer and will be remembered as perhaps the most significant novelist of the second half of the 20th century in Britain. He will have charted our decline and recorded the nature of our bureaucracies like no one else has. But that's just been his route into some profound anxiety in the national narrative. Most writers I know think le Carre is no longer a spy writer. He should have won the Booker Prize a long time ago. It's time he won it and it's time he accepted it. He's in the first rank. -- Ian McEwan Telegraph No other writer has charted - pitilessly for politicians but thrillingly for readers - the public and secret histories of his times, from the Second World War to the War on Terror Guardian One of those writers who will be read a century from now -- Robert Harris With A Delicate Truth, le Carre has in a sense come home. And it's a splendid homecoming ... Satisfying, subtle and compelling The Times The perfectly paced, exquisitely cynical style that is le Carre's hallmark Sunday Times The master of the modern spy novel returns ... this is writing of such quality that - as Robert Harris put it - it will be read in one hundred years Daily Mail A brilliant climax, with sinister deaths, casual torture, wrecked lives and shameful compromises Observer John le Carre has lost none of his ability in skewering the murkier foibles of the British Establishment. A tale of deception, greed, betrayal and ultimately, revenge ... it is not until the last few pages that the full three dimensions of the plot are thrillingly revealed Country Life A writer of towering gifts ... le Carre is one of the great analysts of the contemporary scene, who has a talent to provoke as well as unsettle Independent John le Carre takes us back to his favourite scenarios: Whitehall, the secret services, the gentleman's clubs, dodgy bankers, corrupt public schoolboys and gruesome American neo-cons ... revelling once more in that imaginary world of secrets and lies that is le Carre's gift to us Evening Standard Tense, twisty, and driven by a melancholy insight into human motivation ... deeply compelling The Week John le Carre is as recognisable a writer as Dickens or Austen, with an often-imitated but never rivalled cast of seedy spies, false lovers, public schoolboys struggling with guilt, and charming but immoral leaders of the brutal establishment ... This is vintage le Carre and highly enjoyable Financial Times Thrilling, suspenseful ... Fans will not be disappointed Sunday Express Utterly convincing characters, a tight plot ... Wonderful Sunday Mirror Thrilling Express Choreographed with unsettling precision Metro When I was under house arrest I was helped by the books of John le Carre ... they were a journey into the wider world ... These were the journeys that made me feel that I was not really cut off from the rest of humankind -- Aung San Suu Kyi Plunges the reader into a modern-day thriller...Dad won't be able to put it down Metro [It] has all the essential ingredients of his masterpieces: the dilemmas of duty, patriotism and decency -- Simon Sebag Montefiore Metro 'Books of the Year' John Le Carre at his masterful best ... nobody does it better -- Ben Macintyre The Times 'Books of the Year' Widely hailed as a return to the good old Smiley days ... le Carre writes with laconic elegance -- Kate Saunders The Times 'Books of the Year'

Author Information

John le Carre was born in 1931. For six decades, he wrote novels that came to define our age. The son of a confidence trickster, he spent his childhood between boarding school and the London underworld. At sixteen he found refuge at the university of Bern, then later at Oxford. A spell of teaching at Eton led him to a short career in British Intelligence (MI5&6). He published his debut novel, Call for the Dead, in 1961 while still a secret servant. His third novel, The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, secured him a worldwide reputation, which was consolidated by the acclaim for his trilogy Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, The Honourable Schoolboy and Smiley's People. At the end of the Cold War, le Carre widened his scope to explore an international landscape including the arms trade and the War on Terror. His memoir, The Pigeon Tunnel, was published in 2016 and the last George Smiley novel, A Legacy of Spies, appeared in 2017. He died on 12 December 2020.

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