The John le Carré Universe Continues in ‘Karla’s Choice’ Even Though le Carré is Dead

The collapse of the Soviet Union begat the acceleration of global capitalism which begat the endless recycling of lucrative cultural intellectual property which now — ironically? appropriately? inevitably? — has begotten a second life for the poet laureate of the Cold War as a franchise. 

Published for dads just in time for the holidays, Viking Press is billing ‘Karla’s Choice’ “A John le Carré Novel.” As le Carré died in 2020, his son, novelist Nick Harkaway, handled the writing duties. (Name explainer: David Cornwell took on the pseudonym John le Carré while he was working for British intelligence and writing novels in the early 1960s; son Nicholas adopted the pen name Harkaway when he started writing.)

Tired IP propped up by a nepo baby? Bill Haydon would have sneered. But ‘Karla’s Choice’ is a great read and a welcome return to le Carré land. The only source of trepidation is what lies ahead and how much we may lose of original work by a great writer in his own right. 

Harkaway sets ‘Karla’s Choice’ 1963, after the events of le Carré’s breakthrough novel, ‘The Spy Who Came in from the Cold.’ A Soviet agent in London seeks to defect rather than assassinate a Hungarian emigre turned book publisher by the name of Banati. With said publisher nowhere to be found, his assistant and fellow Hungarian exile Susanna takes him to the secretarial agency that took her on after she fled the 1956 uprising. Someone makes a phone call, British intelligence swoops in, and it turns out Banati is much more than he seems; he may even hold the key to the identity of the semi-mythical Soviet spymaster Karla. Surprising no one, George Smiley comes out of retirement, much to the displeasure of his wife Ann. He and the team chase Banati’s trail from London to Paris to Vienna to Budapest and East Berlin before ending the hunt in Lisbon. 

Harkaway tells the story briskly and largely with that old le Carré feeling (Harkaway did have a test run, having completed his father’s final and posthumously published novel Silverview). The meandering opening before the plot takes hold; the lengthy exposition-laden musings of secondary characters; the strong sense of place; the cat and mouse conversations where what matters is the lacuna; and, of course, the tics and mannerisms of the whole Circus crew from the silences of Control to the ramblings Connie to the cheeky lechery of Bill, and so on. But Harkaway is very much his own writer and confidently puts stamp on the storytelling, including a cracker of a running gun battle in the streets of Budapest.

And while Smiley remained largely opaque in le Carré’s stories — revealing himself only through (minimal) reactions, curt responses and terse lines of questioning — Harkaway opens him a little. Particularly during moments when he communes with the imagined ghost of Alec Leamas, shot dead at the Berlin Wall in ‘The Spy Who Came in from the Cold,’ including when getting ready for his latest case he pulls on an old coat:

He heard Leamas laughing at the neatly mended hem and the old-fashioned style. For Christ’s sake Smiley, you’re a spy, not a mourner! It’s nineteen sixty-three. Get something a tiny bit sharp! Live a little. It doesn’t all have to be shades of dust and bone.

A spy and a mourner, apparently, he told the ghost, and I’m sorry.

No skin off my nose, old boy. I’m not the one who’s been talked back into it, am I? Not this time. 

The character of Smiley’s wife Ann remains a disappointment, but she’s a tough one to improve. An insatiable cougar of good breeding who cucks poor George at every turn, she always was fairly ridiculous (and an odd, if clear, case of projection by le Carré, given his routine infidelities). Harkaway works hard to make her more of an actual human being, showing her genuinely hurt after George ditches her for work instead of going on a holiday trip with her plute friends. Ann’s social set may trigger sympathy for Karla, but the scene goes further in illuminating this marriage than anything from his father’s books. Still; tedious. 

That minor complaint aside, Harkaway successfully recreates the grey Cold War milieu of his father’s books and meaningfully builds on that story, linking the events of ‘Spy’ to the landmark ‘Quest for Karla’ trilogy — ‘Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy,’ ‘The Honourable Schoolboy’ and ‘Smiley’s People.’ He also fleshes out the story of Karla while foreshadowing the seeds of his ultimate undoing. I, like many men of a certain age who watched Obi-wan Kenobi play Smiley on the BBC productions of ‘Tinker’ and ‘Smiley’s People,’ can’t wait to see what comes next. 

With two concerns. ‘Karla’s Choice’ gets this new venture off to a strong start, it’s clearly the best story to lead with, but what’s the encore? How deeply can Harkaway (or successors?) mine le Carré’s oeuvre for stories before running dry, or, worse, settling to grind out content that fails to meet the standard but will surely make a buck

And then there’s Harkaway. The more time he spends on his father’s stories the less he has for his own, which is unfortunate as he’s a grand writer in his own right. His Titanium Noir was one of the better books of 2023. And as skillful as he may be in maneuvering Smiley & Co. through new plots to cast light on old stories or use the gang to interrogate contemporary issues, he’ll still be working with his father’s tools. And close as he may be to the these stories — and as conscientious as he clearly is about taking on this task— he’s working with secondhand materials. Writing and publishing ‘Spy’ was a massive leap of faith by le Carré that involved no small amount of psychological strain — a strain that informed everything that followed.

The best of le Carré’s work stands as capital L literature. The best that Harkaway will be able to manage are first-rate genre pieces. While a boon for the fans of quality spy stories, I don’t know how great it will be for Harkaway.

Tim will tell. In the meantime a Smiley storm (including, potentially, a TV reboot) is coming our way. Wipe your glasses, preferably on your tie, and get ready.