The Pigeon Tunnel by John Le Carre

My second book about spies in a couple of months – must be something going on. This one was a fascinating collection of memoirs and family snippets covering Le Carre’s career as a spy and later as a novelist. I absolutely lapped it up. It was full of veiled detail about spies he knew and diplomats he met and worked with, as well as a lot of detail about the workings of the post WWII government in Germany, which remained full of Nazis who had changed their spots. He talks at length about his conman father, who sounds like a combination of a complete bastard and an utter charmer, the sort of personality they make movies about. It’s not written in chapters but in sections, some as short as a few lines and others continuing over twenty or more pages, so it’s ideal to pick up and put down. Neither is it chronological, which also makes it accessible for the haphazard reader. And of course his writing is superb. I now want to go back and reread all his fiction!