From the New York Times bestselling author of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy; Our Kind of Traitor; and The Night Manager, now a television series starring Tom Hiddleston. John le Carré’s new novel, A Legacy of Spies, is now available.Tell Max that it concerns the Sandman… but it could have been the Chief of the Circus himself. No one at the British Secret Service considers the old spy to be anything except a senile has-been who can’t give up the game—until he’s shot in the face at point-blank range. Although George Smiley (code name: Max) is officially retired, he’s summoned to identify the body now bearing Moscow Centre’s bloody imprimatur. As he works to unearth his friend’s fatal secrets, Smiley heads inexorably toward one final reckoning with Karla—his dark “grail.”
In Smiley’s People, master storyteller and New York Times bestselling author of The Spy Who Came in from the Cold and Our Kind of Traitor John le Carré brings his acclaimed Karla Trilogy, to its unforgettable, spellbinding conclusion.
With an introduction by the author.
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I’ve read a couple of hundred spy novels, and this is my all-time favorite. Maybe it’s because of the build-up from the predecessors, “Tinker, Tailor” and, to a lesser extent, “The Honourable Schoolboy” but actually it’s because le Carre is at the top of his game. He masterfully introduces the bit players via other bit players one instrument at a time until the orchestra is roaring away.
By this late date, George Smiley (operating as “Max”) and Alec Guinness were interchangeable in both le Carre’s and my minds, which made it very easy to understand motive and extrapolate beyond the words on the page. Meanwhile, le Carre’s command of detail unpaints every decrepit waterfront warehouse, loosens the planks on treacherous docks and leads us inexorably to a scene of death and redemption. And he repeats this trick scene after scene until the inevitable climax in Berlin.
I recently bought the BBC’s mini-series. If it is even half as good as this book, it will make for six hours of fascinating viewing. (The series turned out to be good!)
This is not an easy read, it requires the reader to read carefully to follow the characters and their code names. The reader will feel the humanity of the characters. It is not an action packed gimmick filled spy thriller, but rather a more realistic tale of spies during the cold war era. This is the first in a series, and I recommend that you read all three.
I always feel smarter after reading a LeCarre novel.
Sure. I learn something about the spy word each book.
But its the prose. The wordplay. My goodness, I love it.
Master of writing about Cold War era.
The usual John LeCarre – thoughtful, realistic, complicated. Good read!
Never miss one of his books. He is a must read every time.
One of LeCarre’s best, which means it is one of the best ever.
Superb characters. Engaging plot. Outstanding book.
Helped me understand the characters I n his other books
John Le’Carre is a master at spy craft storytelling.
Smiley is always a good read. I am getting more nervous with suspense, but I really like the writing.
Re-reading this book is like visiting with old friends. George Smiley is one of my all-time favorite literary characters.
A fascinating novel about British spies
The third of what I call the “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy” trilogy, which means the finest espionage novels ever written.
A great bookend to those that are a fan and LeCarre and one of his recurring characters George Smiley. I continue to be entertained with John LeCarre’s intelligent writing style. Normally I tend to gravitate toward non-fiction, but his novels paint such a realistic portrait of life in the intelligence services and other dark corners of our governments, that it is hard to discern the fiction from real life experiences (or inspirations).
If you are a fan of John Le Carre you will like this book.
Slow- difficult to follow.
Le Carre is undoubtably the best spy novelist of the long Cold War era between the West and the Soviet Union. George Smiley as master spy agent for “Control” in England’s secret service is a brilliant and compelling character.
The spy genre, necessarily a world apart, enables the author to make wry comments on our mundane, everyday life without doing so overtly.
Love his books but this one was extremely hard to follow