Imitation can be a life and death business in the world of John le Carré’s novels. Cleverly falsified documents might lead agents down the wrong path and into the clutches of the enemy. A good spy must be able to slough off their own identity to take on new ones. In Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, the late secret service operative turned novelist’s master work, a double agent manages to dupe the British establishment for decades, thanks to his convincing performance as the classic English gentleman. Now, though, the most audacious act of imitation in the le Carré universe is not one carried out by fictional spies, but by the author’s son.
The bespectacled and “breathtakingly ordinary” intelligence officer George Smiley was first introduced to readers in le Carré’s debut novel Call For The Dead and, over the course of nine novels, emerged as an anti-Bond: more likely to be found sifting through old filing cabinets than speeding off in getaway cars. He is undramatic and unassuming, a thwarted academic rather than an action man, and is prone to stew over the moral implications of his work for decades. When le Carré died in 2020 at the age of 89, it seemed that his 2017 book A Legacy of Spies would be the final outing for his iconic character. But last year, it was announced that Nick Harkaway – the youngest of le Carré’s four children and a successful novelist in his own right, who has adopted an alias much like his father did – was working on a new Smiley story. The response was cautiously optimistic. To shrug off any accusations of being the ultimate “nepo author”, it always helps if said author actually has a solid back list behind them, like Harkaway does (he’s been writing thrillers and speculative fiction for more than 15 years).
