Single And Single

A lawyer from the London banking house of Single & Single is shot dead on a Turkish hillside by people with whom he thought he was in business. A children's magician in the English countryside is asked by his bank to explain a deposit of over five million pounds sterling in his daughter's trust. A Russian freighter is intercepted by police in the Black Sea. The celebrated London merchant banker, "Tiger" Single disappears into thin air. In Single & Single, the writer who both epitomizes and transcends the spy novel genre, opens with a haunting set-piece, then establishes a sequence of events whose connections are mysterious, complex, and compelling. This is a story of corrupt liaisons between criminal elements in the new Russian states and the world of legitimate finance in Europe. Le Carre's finest novel in years, it is also an intimate story of family deceit in which a son betrays, then redeems, his corrupt father, and a husband triggers the violent demise of his wife's entire clan. Le Carre is writing at the height of his dramatic and creative powers, and Oliver Single, the central protagonist, is one of his most fascinating characters.

Editorial Reviews

gt-product-pods-reviews-collapsed" xmlns:exslt="http://exslt.org/common"> John le Carré is, by a large margin, the modern era's greatest chronicler of the shadowy, morally ambiguous world of espionage. His splendid novel, Single & Single, successfully comes to grips with the rapidly changing social and political realities of a world formed in the aftermath of Soviet communism's spectacular collapse.

Kyle Smith

...le Carre reveals a world at once deeply disquieting and oddly reassuring... —People Magazine

About The Author:

To categorize John le Carr © as a writer of espionage thrillers is not so much inaccurate as it is restrictive. Certainly, his spy novels are the gold standard against which all others are compared, but he writes with such literary elegance and philosophical complexity that his readership extends far beyond genre fans.

What we know of this famously taciturn author's life comes from official records (date of birth, education, marriages, etc.) and whatever biographical tidbits he has seen fit to divulge. He was born David John Moore Cornwell in England in 1931. His mother deserted the family early on, and his father (a charming con artist) floated in and out of jail. Cornwell attended the universities of Berne and Oxford, taught school for a while, then joined the British Foreign Service in 1959 at the height of the Cold War. From there, he was recruited into M16, the UK's secret service. (On his website, he self-effacingly claims to have "spent a few ineffectual but extremely formative...

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Name:John le Carr ©

Also Known As:David John Moore Cornwell (real name)

Current Home:Cornwall and Hampstead, England

Date of Birth:October 19, 1931

Place of Birth:Poole, Dorsetshire, England

Education:Attended Bern University, Switzerland, 1948-49; B.A. in Modern Languages (with honors), Oxford, 1956

Awards:Dagger Award (British Crime Writers' Association) for The Honourable Schoolboy, 1977; Edgar Award for The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, 1965

Biography

To categorize John le Carr © as a writer of espionage thrillers is not so much inaccurate as it is restrictive. Certainly, his spy novels are the gold standard against which all others are compared, but he writes with such literary elegance and philosophical complexity that his readership extends far beyond genre fans.

What we know of this famously taciturn author's life comes from official records (date of birth, education, marriages, etc.) and whatever biographical tidbits he has seen fit to divulge. He was born David John Moore Cornwell in England in 1931. His mother deserted the family early on, and his father (a charming con artist) floated in and out of jail. Cornwell attended the universities of Berne and Oxford, taught school for a while, then joined the British Foreign Service in 1959 at the height of the Cold War. From there, he was recruited into M16, the UK's secret service. (On his website, he self-effacingly claims to have "spent a few ineffectual but extremely formative years in British Intelligence.")

Although his spying career ended abruptly when British double agent Kim Philby blew his cover to the KGB, Cornwell was still working for M16 when he began writing novels. He adopted the nom de plume John le Carr © for his first book, 1961's Call for the Dead, whose memorable first chapter introduced British intelligence officer George Smiley. Quiet, mild-mannered, and morally complex, Smiley offered a stark contrast to James Bond, the glamorous jet-setting spy of Ian Fleming's popular pulp novels. He would also turn out to be the most famous of le Carr ©'s fictional creations.

Le Carr ©'s debut was well received, but it was his third novel, 1963's The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, that proved to be his breakthrough book. This suspense classic recounts the harrowing story of a burnt-out operative, desperate to retire, who is given one last, perilous assignment. Embodying le Carr ©'s cynical, morally ambiguous view of Cold War espionage, the novel won rapturous reviews (Graham Greene called it "The best spy story I have ever read."), received a Gold Dagger and an Edgar Award, and was turned into an award-winning motion picture starring Richard Burton.

The Cold War may have ended, but its demise has done nothing to diminish the power of Le Carr ©s novels. He continues to craft thrillers filled with intrigue, if not espionage; and his books continue to deeply satisfy readers around the world.

Good To Know

Le Carr ©s sister is British actress Charlotte Cornwell, who describes him as "the best brother ever."

The author's most autobiographical novel is 1986's A Perfect Spy, dealing with his tangled relationship with his mostly absent father.

In September of 2008, an interview appeared in The Sunday Times in which le Carr © was [mis]quoted as saying that he had considered defecting to the Russians during his stint with M16. In fact, in his conversation with the interviewer, he had admitted to nothing more than curiosity about life on the other side of the Iron Curtain. "I wasn't tempted ideologically," he says.