A Perfect Spy

A Perfect Spy

Rating

9.5

The Pequod Review:

John le Carre is assumed to write spy novels, but in fact he writes gripping psychological character studies. Nowhere is this more fully realized than in A Perfect Spy, a detailed forensic study of the life of a British Intelligence officer named Magnus Pym. The narrative shifts back and forth between the present day (when Pym has been uncovered as double agent) and Pym's youth — which together reveal the damaged and flawed personality traits that make for the “perfect spy.” This is also the most overtly autobiographical of le Carre's books, with the deceitful con-man based on his own father.