A Delicate Truth
A Novel
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4.1 • 310 Ratings
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- $12.99
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
From the New York Times bestselling author of A Legacy of Spies.
"A novel that beckons us beyond any and all expectations."—Jonathan Yardley, The Washington Post
A counter-terrorist operation, code-named Wildlife, is being mounted on the British crown colony of Gibraltar. Its purpose: to capture and abduct a high-value jihadist arms buyer. Its authors: an ambitious Foreign Office Minister, a private defense contractor who is also his bosom friend, and a shady American CIA operative of the evangelical far-right. So delicate is the operation that even the Minister’s personal private secretary, Toby Bell, is not cleared for it.
Three years later, a disgraced Special Forces Soldier delivers a message from the dead. Was Operation Wildlife the success it was cracked up to be—or a human tragedy that was ruthlessly covered up? Summoned by Sir Christopher “Kit” Probyn, retired British diplomat, to his decaying Cornish manor house, and closely observed by Kit’s daughter, Emily, Toby must choose between his conscience and duty to his Service. If the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing, how can he keep silent?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
State-sanctioned duplicity drives bestseller le Carr 's entertainingly labyrinthine if overly polemical 23rd novel, which features a corrupt British Foreign Office minister, Fergus Quinn, and an American private defense contractor "best known as Ethical Outcomes." In 2008, a cloak-and-dagger plot to capture an arms dealer in Gibraltar under the mantle of counterterrorism goes awry. Quinn's secretary, Toby Bell, who was kept out of the loop, has incriminating information about the mission and the chance to use it three years later when one of the soldiers involved ends up dead and a retired British diplomat, roped into participating against his will, tries to salve his conscience about some nasty pieces of collateral damage. As usual, le Carr (Our Kind of Traitor) tells a great story in sterling prose, but he veers dangerously close to farce and caricature, particularly with the comically amoral Americans. His best work has been about the moral ambiguity of spying, while this novel feels as if the issue of who's bad and who's good is too neatly sewn up.
Customer Reviews
Great new Le Carre
Love the British flair of spy novels that only Le Carré has truly mastered. Interesting ending that lets the reader decide. Ive read everyone of his books and hope there are more to come. Thank you Sir John!
A Delicate Truth
I have read many Le Carre books, and most were good to very good. This book, A Delicate Truth, is terrible. Poorly written and not even a believable story line. It is one of the worse books that I have read in years, and I read, on average, 25 books per year. Le Carre should be ashamed of himself for even putting his name on the cover. I would like to demand my money back, as this book is not worth 5 cents.
No conclusion and nothing happens
Quick read but author talks himself in circles and leaves the barely there plot with no conclusion. Highly disappointing