4.0
Karla's Choice
ByPublisher Description
The instant international bestseller set in the world of John le Carré's most iconic spy, George Smiley, written by acclaimed novelist Nick Harkaway
It is spring in 1963 and George Smiley has left the Circus. With the wreckage of the West’s spy war against the Soviets strewn across Europe, he has eyes only for a more peaceful life. And indeed, with his marriage more secure than ever, there is a rumor that George Smiley might almost be happy.
But Control has other plans. A Russian agent has defected in the most unusual of circumstances, and the man he was sent to kill in London is nowhere to be found. Smiley reluctantly agrees to one last simple task: interview Szusanna, a Hungarian émigré and employee of the missing man, and sniff out a lead.
But in his absence, the shadows of Moscow have lengthened. Smiley soon finds himself entangled in a perilous mystery that will define the battles to come and set him on a collision course with the greatest enemy he will ever make.
Set in the missing decade between two iconic instalments in John le Carré's George Smiley saga, The Spy Who Came in from the Cold and Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Karla’s Choice marks a momentous return to the world of spy fiction's greatest writer.
It is spring in 1963 and George Smiley has left the Circus. With the wreckage of the West’s spy war against the Soviets strewn across Europe, he has eyes only for a more peaceful life. And indeed, with his marriage more secure than ever, there is a rumor that George Smiley might almost be happy.
But Control has other plans. A Russian agent has defected in the most unusual of circumstances, and the man he was sent to kill in London is nowhere to be found. Smiley reluctantly agrees to one last simple task: interview Szusanna, a Hungarian émigré and employee of the missing man, and sniff out a lead.
But in his absence, the shadows of Moscow have lengthened. Smiley soon finds himself entangled in a perilous mystery that will define the battles to come and set him on a collision course with the greatest enemy he will ever make.
Set in the missing decade between two iconic instalments in John le Carré's George Smiley saga, The Spy Who Came in from the Cold and Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Karla’s Choice marks a momentous return to the world of spy fiction's greatest writer.
Download the free Fable app
Stay organized
Keep track of what you’re reading, what you’ve finished, and what’s next.
Build a better TBR
Swipe, skip, and save with our smart list-building tool
Rate and review
Share your take with other readers with half stars, emojis, and tags
Curate your feed
Meet readers like you in the Fable For You feed, designed to build bookish communitiesStay organized
Keep track of what you’re reading, what you’ve finished, and what’s next.Build a better TBR
Swipe, skip, and save with our smart list-building toolRate and review
Share your take with other readers with half stars, emojis, and tagsCurate your feed
Meet readers like you in the Fable For You feed, designed to build bookish communities22 Reviews
4.0
DrSolarHat
Created 6 days agoShare
Report
Mackenzie Hogan
Created 14 days agoShare
Report
Scott Pope
Created 17 days agoShare
Report
“Slow start but built to something. My introduction to Smiley so excited to read more from the man himself.”Munehito Moro
Created about 1 month agoShare
Report
“I cannot respect the author of this book, Nick Harkaway, more.
Think about it. You are tasked to write a book. That book happens to be a George Smiley book.
Many writers, including https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/32590.Anthony_Horowitz , https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/4229.Sebastian_Faulks , and https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/8170.William_Boyd penned James Bond novels. Many of them are good. However, Bond novels have a strong, recognizable formula to follow, and paradoxically, you get more elbow room as long as you stay inside that formula.
Smiley books are a different beast. Yes, he loves his wife, Anne. Yes, he's kind of enslaved by his boss, Control. There are familiar faces like Jim Prideaux, Peter Guillam, and Bill Haydon (whom Colin Firth acted with such flair), and, of course, Karla. You need to keep them in right order in your story while weaving an original tale. This is a complicated, Herculean task.
Harkaway wisely chose Hungary for the setting of this novel. The choice gives a fresh air of breath to this work, as the country hasn't been explored much in the espionage genre. The novel feels original, even though it's set in the 60s.
What captures any le Carré fan is the opening. A beautiful boy dancing in a bar. That was a perfect replication of le Carré's universe. It reminds you of the world of The Honourable Schoolboy or The Little Drummer Girl. This book eases its readers into its universe by the power of imitation, like a masterful trick of hypnotization. Then Harkaway begins his own show.
Of course Harkaway knows the ins and outs of his father's universe. We can feel the ghost of Alec Leamas haunting every page, continuing the thread from The Spy Who Came in from the Cold and The Legacy of Spies. This sense of ghost, the past, reassures the readers while the story ventures into the new.
Karla is probably the greatest antagonist in the espionage genre, and Harkaway manages to keep him shrouded in a dense fog of secrecy while displaying the character way more than his father did in the original Karla Trilogy. This updated, younger Karla doesn't compromise the original, faceless Karla.
Overall, this novel displays a great skill in crafting a complicated plot while keeping faithful to the original. Possibly the only flaw is that one needs to have read The Legacy of Spies (and know how le Carré himself modified the characters) to fully understand the plot. However, it's not a big favor to ask a le Carré enthusiast, or any espionage-fiction enthusiast, to have finished this homework before getting around to this wonderful contribution to the legacy.”
William Emory
Created about 1 month agoShare
Report
“Harkaway, John LeCarre’s son, puts us in Cold War 1963 with George Smiley, a spy trying to retire, but coaxed back into one more mission. Like his father’s novels, Harkaway leads us through the intelligence world’s murky moves, countermoves, deceptions and betrayals. Above all, the secret world runs by no rules except to win. But what does winning mean: advantage, influence, survival? For readers who have not read The Spy Who Came In From The Cold, some subtler references may be unclear but it doesn’t create a real problem for enjoying this well written, cleverly plotted spy novel.
A couple of lines:
“Smiley believed not in ideology but-against all evidence-in people, which was a sin no one in the secret world could afford.”
“He was not the poetic sort at all;he had reports in him, she thought, but not songs.””
About Nick Harkaway
Nick Harkaway is the author of five novels, Titanium Noir, The Gone-Away World, Angelmaker, Tigerman, and Gnomon, as well as a nonfiction work about digital culture, The Blind Giant: Being Human in a Digital World. He is also a regular blogger for The Bookseller's FutureBook website. He lives in London with his wife, a human rights lawyer, and their two children.
Other books by Nick Harkaway
Start a Book Club
Start a public or private book club with this book on the Fable app today!FAQ
Do I have to buy the ebook to participate in a book club?
Why can’t I buy the ebook on the app?
How is Fable’s reader different from Kindle?
Do you sell physical books too?
Are book clubs free to join on Fable?
How do I start a book club with this book on Fable?
Similar Books
Save to a list
0
/30
0
/100
Private List