Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.57 AVERAGE
3.57 AVERAGE
Didn't care about the inter-agency intrigues and could have done without the creepy ruminations on women. Just watch the miniseries with Tom Hiddleston and Hugh Laurie.
dark
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
adventurous
mysterious
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
I messed up by watching most -- but not all -- of the terrific miniseries before reading this. I stopped when I realized that I wanted to read the book... but then it turns out the miniseries is actually one of the few adaptations that improves on the source material. So I imagined Burr as a woman the whole time I was reading, despite that not being the case, and I desperately wished for the setup to move it the fuck along during the first ~250 pages, before Pine actually shows up at Roper's court. But I'd stopped the series quickly enough to get caught up in the machinations of le Carré's plot (which, far as I can tell, does diverge quite greatly from the televised one) and while I wished that le Carré would focus in on Pine (the more thrilling story) instead of bouncing back to the anonymous flunkies of Whitehall... well, you come to a le Carré for the doughy desk spies, not for the derring-do.
Good, if over-long. Watch the series, don't think too hard about it.
Good, if over-long. Watch the series, don't think too hard about it.
adventurous
dark
slow-paced
Fine plot, fine Le Carre-esque characters, but just so plodding, over-written, and (please do take this the wrong way) "literary" that it was a struggle to force myself to pick it up and grind through another 20 pages of descriptive, reflective, introspective nothing-happening. Did Not Finish.
If I hadn't been reading this for a book club I recently joined I would have probably quit within the first quarter of the book. This was my first time reading a spy novel and there are likely better books to explore in this genre.
The book follows a night manager, Jonathan Pine and his transformation into a spy within the ranks of a large scale arms dealer. In the background, a flurry of characters are introduced to the reader that it becomes difficult to keep straight who are Americans, British, who is a part of what agency and what the various ties and motives of the various are. Female characters appear to be intentionally flat much to the disappointment of the readers and the main character himself. Occasionally, I found the novel difficult to follow or understand the relevance of a given passage.
The author, in addition to the large cast of characters, asks the reader to endure over 200 pages of setup before really getting into the thick of the plot. There is also the assumption the reader is aware of the various geographical locations of British and American intelligence agencies - - which for someone picking this up as an intro into the spy genre meant the book put up a lot of hurdles in comprehending the plot more seamlessly. After reading over 500 pages, the book disappointedly ended in a complete bore.
Would I recommend it? Probably not unless you are into this genre, and even then, maybe not. Was it god awful? No. While the prose was well written there is much about this book that could have been improved: plot, length, and character development to start.
The book follows a night manager, Jonathan Pine and his transformation into a spy within the ranks of a large scale arms dealer. In the background, a flurry of characters are introduced to the reader that it becomes difficult to keep straight who are Americans, British, who is a part of what agency and what the various ties and motives of the various are. Female characters appear to be intentionally flat much to the disappointment of the readers and the main character himself. Occasionally, I found the novel difficult to follow or understand the relevance of a given passage.
The author, in addition to the large cast of characters, asks the reader to endure over 200 pages of setup before really getting into the thick of the plot. There is also the assumption the reader is aware of the various geographical locations of British and American intelligence agencies - - which for someone picking this up as an intro into the spy genre meant the book put up a lot of hurdles in comprehending the plot more seamlessly. After reading over 500 pages, the book disappointedly ended in a complete bore.
Would I recommend it? Probably not unless you are into this genre, and even then, maybe not. Was it god awful? No. While the prose was well written there is much about this book that could have been improved: plot, length, and character development to start.
It's utterly gripping, well-paced, interesting characters (especially the women, though there are not many). I found it really entertaining although the ending it's a bit unsatisfying.
adventurous
tense
medium-paced
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes