The Honourable Schoolboy, John Le Carre (4)
This book begins with George Smiley and his crew in the dog-house after it’s been discovered that the famous Soviet agent, Karla (yes, love that), had a high placed mole in their midst. As most Smiley stories, it’s more about the suspense than action and difficult to follow due to British spy jargon and an extremely complicated story. Information comes to Smiley’s group that there is a Chinese mole in Hong Kong working with the Soviets. Obviously written pre-reintegration with China, Hong Kong is still a British colony and China and USSR are not ‘friends’. Smiley cautiously investigates hoping that a discovery would thwart Karla and bring glory back to the group. While I enjoyed the detail, this is not a spy novel for everyone. Major plot points can come across as an aside, so one must pay close attention. Also, for such a long book, it oddly ended very abruptly. I believe this book is lesser known as it is a bit less approachable.
