Call for the Dead

John le Carré

Nov 2011 · Penguin UK

About this ebook

'The new crime and espionage series from Penguin Classics makes for a mouth-watering prospect' Daily Telegraph

An apparent suicide. A deepening mystery. A letter from a dead man...

Secret agent George Smiley is in trouble. A Foreign Office civil servant, Samuel Fennan, has killed himself, and Smiley realizes that Intelligence head Maston is going to set him up to take the blame. Beginning his own investigation, Smiley is shocked to receive an urgent letter from the dead man, and slowly uncovers a network of deceit and betrayal. Le Carré's debut novel was also the first of his many books to feature the tenacious, unassuming and singular George Smiley.

Ratings and reviews

A really good read. Short because there is no pre-amble.....straight down to business with the action and the plot,very readable and enjoyable.

This is my first foray into John Le Carre books and it is as good as I have been led to believe it would be.

A good read, a bit short but good.

About the author

John le Carré was born in 1931. After studying at the university of Bern and Oxford and teaching at Eton, he began a short career in British Intelligence (MI5&6). He published his debut novel, Call for the Dead, in 1961 while still a civil servant, and acclaim swiftly followed, consolidated by The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, and his trilogy Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, The Honourable Schoolboy and Smiley's People. At the end of the Cold War, le Carré widened his scope to explore an international landscape including the arms trade and the War on Terror. He died on 12 December 2020.