10 hours Ago By Reviewed by Nick Martin
Moscow Centre dispatches an assassin to eliminate a minor London publisher who can’t quite hide the traces of a Hungarian accent and a secret past of decades of subterfuge — forcing Control to beseech George Smiley (pause for sighs of reverence) to return to The Circus. Read this article for free: Already have an account? To continue reading, please subscribe: * Moscow Centre dispatches an assassin to eliminate a minor London publisher who can’t quite hide the traces of a Hungarian accent and a secret past of decades of subterfuge — forcing Control to beseech George Smiley (pause for sighs of reverence) to return to The Circus. Read unlimited articles for free today: Already have an account? Moscow Centre dispatches an assassin to eliminate a minor London publisher who can’t quite hide the traces of a Hungarian accent and a secret past of decades of subterfuge — forcing Control to beseech George Smiley (pause for sighs of reverence) to return to The Circus.
Thus launches a trail of intrigue from London to Berlin to Vienna and behind the Iron Curtain to Budapest and on to Lisbon — betrayal, obfuscation, lies as a way of life and whispers of an exceptionally dangerous Russian intelligence chief, lurking, known only as...
Karla. If those two paragraphs mean anything to you, you’re now likely thrown into a state of absolute delight — yet skeptical, indeed apprehensive, that brutal disappointment is nigh. Because is not a discovered lost manuscript by the late John le Carré, the greatest author of spy novels the world has ever known.
Karla’s Choice No, it’s written by someone else. But who could possibly write anything remotely approaching the verbal magic of le Carré? Who indeed — how about John le Carré’s son, Nick Harkaway? He aced it. is a treasure, and it’s ours.
It’s the early 1960s, after le Carré’s and before ; many avidly claim one or the other as the best spy novel ever written. Spymaster Smiley has retired and is trying to live what passes as a normal, boring life with his wife Ann, having left British intelligence after the tragic ending of , which will not be spoiled here. From Moscow comes an assassin bent on killing the operator of a small-time publishing house somewhere in the back streets of London.
The aforementioned publisher scarpers just in time, the sorry affair coming to the attention of British intelligence. Who is this publisher that Moscow would take such draconian action? Or, more accurately, who was he, why was he in London all these years and why do the commies want him dead? Like you’ll get answers here. For reasons you’ll discover for yourself, only one spy can answer these questions and bring this mystery man in, with enticements to tell all.
The names you fondly remember, they’re here at The Circus, and on station in Europe and both sides of the Iron Curtain: Peter Guillam, Toby Esterase, Connie Sachs, Jim Prideaux, Bill Haydon. And Control, the unnamed boss of them all, manipulating everyone, willing to sacrifice anyone in defence of the realm. It’s not unusual for other writers to try resurrecting popular characters of dead authors, with a wildly varying results; there are oodles of books about Sherlock Holmes, Hercule Poirot, James Bond.
The results are often indifferent. Here Harkaway has hit upon his father’s cadence and his lyrical language in both dialogue and narration. This is the George Smiley with whom we shared the joy of thousands of pages, a nondescript boring little bespectacled man, underestimated by all, yet of inestimable intelligence and guile and encyclopedic memory, whether we picture him as Sir Alec Guinness or Gary Oldman.
We know Smiley survives , as do many characters we’ve met before, yet we have not a clue how the book will end or what will befall anyone in it. A sense of doom pervades the book, a smothering melancholy. It is superb.
Harkaway tells readers that he hopes the book will leave them wanting more. Oh yes. Yes please.
Retired Free Press reporter Nick Martin believes that Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy is the best espionage novel he has ever read. If you disagree with him, he has only to leave a coded message in the little hollow spot under the third park bench past the statue of..
.. Karla’s Choice:A John le Carré Novel By Nick Harkaway Penguin Random House,320 pages, $36 Advertisement Advertisement.
