Showing results by author "Len Deighton" in All Categories

Embattled agent Bernard Samson is used to being passed over for promotion as his younger, more ambitious colleagues - including his own wife, Fiona - rise up the ranks of MI6. When a valued agent in East Berlin warns the British of a mole at the heart of the Service, Samson must return to the field and the city he loves to uncover the traitor's identity. This is the first novel in Len Deighton's acclaimed Game, Set and Match trilogy.

Steve Champion—flamboyant businessman, former leader of an anti-Nazi network in the Second World War—is a man surrounded by mysteries. There are rumors he is still in the spying business. And suspicions that his fortune may be built on something nefarious; something he'd rather stayed secret. The Department are nervous, so Champion's oldest wartime ally is sent to the South of France to investigate. It's time to reopen the file on yesterday's spy, whatever the consequences.

After six weeks in a nuclear submarine gathering computer data on Soviet activity, the mysterious, bespectacled spy known as Patrick Armstrong is desperate to return home. But when he arrives at his London flat, it appears to be occupied by someone who looks just like him—and he finds himself propelled into the heart of a conspiracy stretching from the remote Scottish highlands to the Arctic ice.

Bernard is trying hard to readjust his life in the face of questions about his wife, Fiona, and her defection to the East. Is she the brilliant high-flyer that her Department seems to think she is? Or is she a spent force, a wife and mother unwilling or unable to face her domestic responsibilities? Bernard doesn't know but is determined to find out. Bernard's boss, Dicky Cruyer, is certainly not anxious to reveal what he knows, as he jostles for power with Fiona herself in London Central, and takes to the road with Bernard on a mysterious mission to Poland.

History is swamped by patriotic myths about the aerial combat fought between the RAF and the Luftwaffe over the summer of 1940. In his gripping history of the Battle of Britain, Len Deighton drew on a decade of research and his own wartime experiences to puncture these myths and point towards a more objective, and even more inspiring, truth.

It is 1941, and Germany has won the war. Britain is occupied, Churchill executed and the king imprisoned in the Tower of London. At Scotland Yard, Detective Inspector Archer tries to do his job and keep his head down. But when a body is found in a Mayfair flat, what at first appears to be a routine murder investigation sends him into a world of espionage, deceit and betrayal.

A sunken U-boat has lain undisturbed on the Atlantic ocean floor since the Second World War - until now. Inside its rusting hull, among the corpses of top-rank Nazis, lie secrets people will kill to obtain. The sequel to Len Deighton's game-changing debut The IPCRESS File, Horse Under Water sees its nameless, laconic narrator sent from fogbound London to the Algarve, where he must dive through layers of deceit in a place rotten with betrayals.

1963 Berlin is dark and dangerous. The anonymous hero of The IPCRESS File has been sent to help arrange the defection - in an elaborate mock coffin - of a leading Soviet scientist. But, as he soon discovers, this deception hides an even deadlier truth. One of the first novels written after the construction of the Berlin Wall, Funeral in Berlin revels in the murky, chilling atmosphere of a divided city.

A high-ranking scientist has been kidnapped. A secret British intelligence agency must find out why. But as the quarry is pursued from grimy Soho to the other side of the world, what seemed a straightforward mission turns into something far more sinister. With its sardonic, cool, working-class hero, Len Deighton's sensational debut The IPCRESS File rewrote the spy thriller and became the defining novel of 1960s London.

Bernard continues to chip away at the mystery of his sister-in-law Tessa Kosinski's death in Berlin on the crucial night when his wife, Fiona, was brought out of the East. Fighting to uncover the truth, he must also confront the key relationships in his own life: Fiona is still far from stable now that she has returned to work, and their children remain in the clutches of his wealthy and manipulative father-in-law. Meanwhile, Werner Volkmann, Bernard's friend since childhood, is reluctant to get involved in Bernard's crusade.

History is swamped by patriotic myths about the aerial combat fought between the RAF and the Luftwaffe over the summer of 1940. In his gripping history of the Battle of Britain, Len Deighton drew on a decade of research and his own wartime experiences to puncture these myths and point towards a more objective, and even more inspiring, truth.

Peter and Paul, the two sons of German businessman Harald Winter, are bonded together by a childhood trauma. But as they grow up, the brothers also grow apart. When the shadow of the Third Reich falls, they become divided by war and their differing ideals - only to meet again years later at the Nuremberg trials. An epic prelude to the Bernard Samson Game, Set and Match trilogy, Winter is a rich, tragic portrait of the fortunes of a family, and a nation, over half a century.

Of all the mysteries Bernard Samson has encountered, the greatest is his wife, Fiona. Dedicated agent of the Service and a woman of secrets, she will risk everything to play the long game. As the truth about the decision that shattered their marriage is gradually revealed, the web of deception that has snared Bernard for 10 years begins to unravel.

World-weary agent Bernard Samson is losing control of his personal and professional life. Sent to Mexico to aid the defection of a KGB agent to the West, he has a chance to prove his worth. Instead, he is torn between conflicting loyalties and lost in a maze of double-dealing and duplicity. The second novel in the Game, Set and Match trilogy is a gripping portrayal of a man who can trust no one, not even those closest to him.

Millions of pounds have gone missing, and the Department have sent agent Bernard Samson to Washington to track them down. But this mission is just the start of something far deeper and darker. It will take him from the English suburbs to Berlin, the South of France to Los Angeles and the heart of a maelstrom. In the first part of the Hook, Line and Sinker trilogy, friends become enemies, pursuer becomes victim and no one - not even Bernard himself - is above suspicion.

Long-suffering spy Bernard Samson has, against all the odds, enticed a Soviet agent to defect to London - but this proves to be the start of something even bigger. For he learns that there is treachery within his own Service, and no one is free from suspicion. To discover who really controls the game of spies, he must attempt a desperate gamble. As the Game, Set and Match trilogy reaches its shattering finale, who will make the winning move?

Bernard has known that he is not getting the full picture from London Central ever since discovering that his wife, Fiona, was a double agent. Werner Volkmann has been cast out by London Central as untrustworthy. Yet Werner still seems able to pick up information that Bernard should have been told.

Bernard Samson is a spy on the run. But in the murky streets of Berlin, he knows where to hide. Wanted for an act of treachery he has not committed, he must not only escape the grasp of London Central but get to the bottom of a tangled conspiracy that is about to change everything. In the thrilling penultimate instalment of the Hook, Line and Sinker trilogy, Bernard's personal and professional life collide with devastating consequences.

When the unnamed British agent in this story is sent to take custody of a defecting Russian scientist, his mission takes him to the Arab world and the Sahara desert as he is consistently foiled by a US Secret Service high-up. Loyalty is tested and never certain, as it becomes unclear as the novel develops who is actually chasing whom, and where the threat is coming from.

Texan billionaire General Midwinter will stop at nothing to bring down the USSR - even if it puts the whole world at risk. The fourth and final novel featuring the cynical, insolent narrator of The IPCRESS File sees him sent from his shabby Soho office to bone-freezing Helsinki in order to penetrate Midwinter's vast anti-Communist network - and stop a deadly virus from wiping out the planet.