Single & Single

Another highly successful le Carré novel, perhaps one of the best I have read recently. le Carré may have a proven formula, but it works. His sense of conveying a world of duplicitous dealings, how both criminals and the good guys operate, is second to none. Part of the compulsion to read on comes from the gradual revealing of different secrets. Think of reading this work, or any other by the author, as akin to peeling back layers of an onion, or lifting a series of Russian dolls out from each other. le Carré, in contrast to a writer such as Graham Greene, does not explicitly seek to moralise, or have his characters undergo crises of conscience. This creates a cleaner, more propulsive narrative, more action than thought. Single & Single kept great pace across its circa 400 pages, and I felt the conclusion provided fitting resolution, 9½/10.

By John le Carré