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paul_cornelius's review against another edition
4.0
The opening and closing of Twinkle Twinkle Little Spy, set in the desert, have "sizzle," as the newspaper reviewers might put it. Fast paced, witty quips, episodes of fear, lust, and surprise fix on virtually every page. You simply don't want to put the book down--until you come to the middle part, which tends to be a repetitive slow-go at times. Nonetheless, it's a first rate spy novel and adventure story. Complete with plenty of cultural markers contemporary to the time it was written, many of which will zoom right past contemporary readers.
One comparison to make. This novel bears some similarity to Hammond Innes' wonderful 1956 spy thriller set in Morocco and the desert among the Berbers, The Strange Land. Innes' story is better. So are the stories of defecting spies and vengeance. I might even go so far to say that Len Deighton's story is a more space age update on Innes' book than anything else.
One comparison to make. This novel bears some similarity to Hammond Innes' wonderful 1956 spy thriller set in Morocco and the desert among the Berbers, The Strange Land. Innes' story is better. So are the stories of defecting spies and vengeance. I might even go so far to say that Len Deighton's story is a more space age update on Innes' book than anything else.
speesh's review against another edition
3.0
"There's often a world of difference between what things mean, and what they are supposed to mean."
This is only going to be a short one (“phew!”), as even though it was by the (otherwise) great Len Deighton, it really didn’t connect with me in any meaningful way. I don’t feel as though I’ve ever really got to know the two main characters. Nor any of the minor ones. I never really felt attached to them in any meaningful way.
A Soviet (we’re back on the Cold War period here), is defecting (rather than defective), as - he says - he wants the freedom to search for life on other planets. The intelligence officers handling the defection, have other ideas and are looking carefully at him, wondering if he might be a plant. Or is it his wife? The main man on ‘our’ side is an American, with a British intelligence officer playing the stooge, his number two. Things go all kinds of wrong, of course, and the story goes racing over from the Sahara, to the US, Paris, Dublin and then ends up back in the Sahara desert. I think you’re supposed to think the Englishman, is ‘Harry Palmer' from ‘The Ipcress File', etc. I didn’t realise that until I read something about it afterwards. So that didn’t make much of an impression, did it?
For all the blurb on the jacket (of the hardback, Book Club Associates version I have) about it revealing ‘a more mature Deighton’ and it being ‘as compelling as it is tantalising’ nothing you could tie it down to or point to in the text, it really wasn’t either. It was a strangely slight tale that was was there and then it was gone. Short, but really not so sharp. Or particularly sweet.
This is only going to be a short one (“phew!”), as even though it was by the (otherwise) great Len Deighton, it really didn’t connect with me in any meaningful way. I don’t feel as though I’ve ever really got to know the two main characters. Nor any of the minor ones. I never really felt attached to them in any meaningful way.
A Soviet (we’re back on the Cold War period here), is defecting (rather than defective), as - he says - he wants the freedom to search for life on other planets. The intelligence officers handling the defection, have other ideas and are looking carefully at him, wondering if he might be a plant. Or is it his wife? The main man on ‘our’ side is an American, with a British intelligence officer playing the stooge, his number two. Things go all kinds of wrong, of course, and the story goes racing over from the Sahara, to the US, Paris, Dublin and then ends up back in the Sahara desert. I think you’re supposed to think the Englishman, is ‘Harry Palmer' from ‘The Ipcress File', etc. I didn’t realise that until I read something about it afterwards. So that didn’t make much of an impression, did it?
For all the blurb on the jacket (of the hardback, Book Club Associates version I have) about it revealing ‘a more mature Deighton’ and it being ‘as compelling as it is tantalising’ nothing you could tie it down to or point to in the text, it really wasn’t either. It was a strangely slight tale that was was there and then it was gone. Short, but really not so sharp. Or particularly sweet.
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