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The Pigeon Tunnel
- Stories from My Life
- Narrated by: John le Carré
- Length: 11 hrs and 36 mins
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Publisher's summary
The New York Times best-selling memoir from John le Carré, the legendary author of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy; The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, and The Night Manager, now an Emmy-nominated television series starring Tom Hiddleston and Hugh Laurie.
From his years serving in British Intelligence during the Cold War, to a career as a writer that took him from war-torn Cambodia to Beirut on the cusp of the 1982 Israeli invasion to Russia before and after the collapse of the Berlin Wall, le Carré has always written from the heart of modern times. In this, his first memoir, le Carré is as funny as he is incisive, reading into the events he witnesses the same moral ambiguity with which he imbues his novels.
Whether he's writing about the parrot at a Beirut hotel that could perfectly mimic machine gun fire or the opening bars of Beethoven’s Fifth; visiting Rwanda’s museums of the unburied dead in the aftermath of the genocide; celebrating New Year’s Eve 1982 with Yasser Arafat and his high command; interviewing a German woman terrorist in her desert prison in the Negev; listening to the wisdoms of the great physicist, dissident, and Nobel Prize winner Andrei Sakharov; meeting with two former heads of the KGB; watching Alec Guinness prepare for his role as George Smiley in the legendary BBC TV adaptations of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy and Smiley’s People; or describing the female aid worker who inspired the main character in The Constant Gardener, le Carré endows each happening with vividness and humor, now making us laugh out loud, now inviting us to think anew about events and people we believed we understood.
Best of all, le Carré gives us a glimpse of a writer’s journey over more than six decades, and his own hunt for the human spark that has given so much life and heart to his fictional characters.
Critic reviews
One of the NP99: National Post’s best books of 2016
“Recounted with the storytelling élan of a master raconteur—by turns dramatic and funny, charming, tart and melancholy.”—Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times
“An illuminating, self-effacing and pleasurable inquiry into le Carré’s creative process, offering globe-spanning thrills of a different, but no less captivating kind than those associated with the novels.”—USA Today
“[Le Carré] is a polished raconteur, with an actor’s protean self-presentation, gifts of pace and timing, aptitude for entrances and exits.”—Wall Street Journal
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-
A spy thriller in disguise
- By Shmuel M on 04-14-19
By: Leon Uris
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Agents of Innocence
- A Novel
- By: David Ignatius
- Narrated by: Peter Berkrot
- Length: 14 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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Agents of Innocence is the book that established David Ignatius's reputation as a master of the novel of contemporary espionage. Into the treacherous world of shifting alliances and arcane subterfuge comes idealistic CIA man Tom Rogers. Posted in Beirut to penetrate the PLO and recruit a high-level operative, he soon learns the heavy price of innocence in a time and place that has no use for it.
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breathy over-actor tarnishes an OK story
- By reader on 05-11-20
By: David Ignatius
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Limonov
- The Outrageous Adventures of the Radical Soviet Poet Who Became a Bum in New York, a Sensation in France, and a Political Antihero in Russia
- By: Emmanuel Carrère, John Lambert - translator
- Narrated by: Vikas Adam
- Length: 12 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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This is how Emmanuel Carrère, the magnetic journalist, novelist, filmmaker, and chameleon, describes his subject: "Limonov is not a fictional character. There. I know him. He has been a young punk in Ukraine, the idol of the Soviet underground; a bum, then a multimillionaire's butler in Manhattan; a fashionable writer in Paris; a lost soldier in the Balkans; and now, in the fantastic shambles of postcommunism, the elderly but charismatic leader of a party of young desperadoes."
By: Emmanuel Carrère, and others
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My Autobiography
- By: Charles Chaplin, David Robinson - introduction
- Narrated by: Steve John Shepherd
- Length: 19 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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Take an unforgettable journey with the man George Bernard Shaw called "the only genius to come out of the movie industry" as he moves from his impoverished South London childhood to the heights of Hollywood wealth and fame; from the McCarthy-era investigations to his founding of United Artists to his "reverse migration" back to Europe.
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Finally Chaplin’s auto is available!
- By Ryan Baumbach on 04-28-22
By: Charles Chaplin, and others
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Men at Arms
- By: Evelyn Waugh
- Narrated by: Christian Rodska
- Length: 8 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Guy Crouchback, determined to get into the war, takes a commission in the Royal Corps of Halberdiers. His spirits high, he sees all the trimmings but none of the action. And his first campaign, an abortive affair on the West African coastline, ends with an escapade that seriously blots his Halberdier copybook. Men at Arms is the first novel in Waugh's brilliant Sword of Honor trilogy recording the tumultuous wartime adventures of Guy Crouchback.
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Supposedly Humorous
- By Kindle Customer on 11-13-18
By: Evelyn Waugh
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Put Out More Flags
- By: Evelyn Waugh
- Narrated by: Michael Maloney
- Length: 5 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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Upper-class scoundrel Basil Seal, mad, bad, and dangerous to know, creates havoc wherever he goes, much to the despair of the three women in his life - his sister, his mother, and his mistress. When Neville Chamberlain declares war on Germany, it seems the perfect opportunity for more action and adventure. So Basil follows the call to arms and sets forth to enjoy his finest hour - as a war hero. Basil's instincts for self-preservation come to the fore as he insinuates himself into the Ministry of Information and a little-known section of Military Security.
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Wickedly Funny
- By Chelz on 07-25-19
By: Evelyn Waugh
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Zoo Station
- John Russell WWII Spy, Book 1
- By: David Downing
- Narrated by: Simon Prebble
- Length: 10 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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By 1939, Anglo-American journalist John Russell has spent over a decade in Berlin, where his son lives with his mother. He writes human-interest pieces for British and American papers, avoiding the investigative journalism that could get him deported. But as World War II approaches, he faces having to leave his son as well as his girlfriend of several years, a beautiful German starlet. When an acquaintance from his old communist days approaches him to do some work for the Soviets, Russell is reluctant, but he is unable to resist the offer.
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Overall great listen!
- By Patricia on 02-28-24
By: David Downing
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Enemies of the People
- My Family's Journey to America
- By: Kati Marton
- Narrated by: Laural Merlington
- Length: 9 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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In this true-life thriller, Kati Marton draws on her skill as an investigative reporter to discover who her journalist parents really were---and how they survived the Nazis in Budapest and imprisonment by the Soviets during the Cold War.
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Couldn't stop listening
- By Jane on 04-09-10
By: Kati Marton
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The Last Goodnight
- A World War II Story of Espionage, Adventure, and Betrayal
- By: Howard Blum
- Narrated by: Tristan Morris
- Length: 14 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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Betty Pack was charming, beautiful, and intelligent - and she knew it. As an agent for Britain's MI6 and then America's OSS during World War II, these qualities proved crucial to her success. This is the remarkable story of this "Mata Hari from Minnesota" ( Time) and the passions that ruled her tempestuous life - a life filled with dangerous liaisons and death-defying missions vital to the Allied victory.
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Fascinating
- By Salui on 11-30-16
By: Howard Blum
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Hitler
- The Memoir of a Nazi Insider Who Turned Against the Fuhrer
- By: Ernst Hanfstaengl
- Narrated by: Robin Sachs
- Length: 11 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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An intimate friend of Adolf Hitler’s who turned against him during the Nazi rise to power delves into the character of one of history’s most evil dictators. Of American and German parentage, Ernst Hanfstaengl graduated from Harvard and ran the family business in New York for a dozen years before returning to Germany in 1921. By chance he heard a then little-known Adolf Hitler speaking in a Munich beer hall and, mesmerized by his extraordinary oratorical power, was convinced the man would some day come to power. As Hitler’s fanatical theories and ideas hardened, however, he surrounded himself with rabid extremists...
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Once a Nazi, always a Nazi
- By Alan on 04-10-13
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Eichmann in My Hands
- A First-Person Account by the Israeli Agent Who Captured Hitler's Chief Executioner
- By: Peter Z. Malkin, Harry Stein
- Narrated by: Jonathan Davis
- Length: 8 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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In 1960 Argentina, a covert team of Israeli agents hunted down the most elusive war criminal alive: Adolf Eichmann, chief architect of the Holocaust. The young spy who tackled Eichmann on a Buenos Aires street - and fought every compulsion to strangle the Obersturmführer then and there - was Peter Z. Malkin. For decades Malkin's identity as Eichmann's captor was kept secret. Here he reveals the entire breathtaking story - from the genesis of the top-secret surveillance operation to the dramatic public capture and smuggling of Eichmann to Israel to stand trial.
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Excellent the first person account
- By Barrett Francescatti on 02-09-22
By: Peter Z. Malkin, and others
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Distant Star
- By: Roberto Bolano
- Narrated by: Walter Krochmal
- Length: 4 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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A chilling novel about the nightmare of a corrupt and brutal dictatorship. The star of Roberto Bolano's hair-raising novel Distant Star is Alberto Ruiz-Tagle, an air force pilot who exploits the 1973 coup to launch his own version of the New Chilean Poetry, a multimedia enterprise involving sky-writing, poetry, torture, and photo exhibitions. For our unnamed narrator, who first encounters this "star" in a college poetry workshop, Ruiz-Tagle becomes the silent hand behind every evil act in the darkness of Pinochet's regime.
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Omg
- By Sierra on 08-03-16
By: Roberto Bolano
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Single & Single
- By: John le Carré
- Narrated by: Michael Jayston
- Length: 12 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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A lawyer from the London finance house of Single & Single is shot dead on a Turkish hillside by people with whom he thought he was in business. A children's magician is asked by his bank to explain the unsolicited arrival of more than five million pounds sterling in his young daughter's modest trust. A freighter bound for Liverpool is boarded by Russian coast guards in the Black Sea. The celebrated London merchant venturer "Tiger" Single disappears into thin air.
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The spy who came back to the bank
- By Darwin8u on 03-12-14
By: John le Carré
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In the Light of What We Know
- By: Zia Haider Rahman
- Narrated by: Ralph Lister
- Length: 21 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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One September morning in 2008, an investment banker approaching forty, his career in collapse and his marriage unraveling, receives a surprise visitor at his West London townhouse. In the disheveled figure of a South Asian male carrying a backpack the banker recognizes a long-lost friend, a mathematics prodigy who disappeared years earlier under mysterious circumstances. The friend has resurfaced to make a confession of unsettling power.
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dreadful
- By sam on 06-05-15
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you want to know what I think?
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Nat, a 47 year-old veteran of Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service, believes his years as an agent runner are over. He is back in London with his wife, the long-suffering Prue. But with the growing threat from Moscow Centre, the office has one more job for him. Nat is to take over The Haven, a defunct substation of London General with a rag-tag band of spies. The only bright light on the team is young Florence, who has her eye on Russia Department and a Ukrainian oligarch with a finger in the Russia pie.
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Who writes “unlistenable etc. “
- By Thomas on 11-02-19
By: John le Carré
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A Perfect Spy
- A Novel
- By: John le Carré
- Narrated by: Michael Jayston
- Length: 20 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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Over the course of his seemingly irreproachable life, Magnus Pym has been all things to all people: a devoted family man, a trusted colleague, a loyal friend - and the perfect spy. But in the wake of his estranged father's death, Magnus vanishes, and the British Secret Service is up in arms. Is it grief, or is the reason for his disappearance more sinister? And who is the mysterious man with the sad moustache who also seems to be looking for Magnus? In A Perfect Spy, John le Carré has crafted one of his crowning masterpieces.
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Remembrances of loyalties past
- By Darwin8u on 04-13-13
By: John le Carré
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A Private Spy
- The Letters of John le Carré
- By: John le Carré, Tim Cornwell - editor
- Narrated by: David Harewood, Florence Pugh
- Length: 16 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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The never-before-seen correspondence of John le Carré, one of the most important novelists of our generation, is collected in this beautiful volume. During his lifetime, le Carré wrote numerous letters to writers, spies, politicians, artists, actors and public figures. This collection is a treasure trove, revealing the late author's humor, generosity, and wit—a side of him many listeners have not previously seen.
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Truly engrossing from start to finish
- By Dan on 01-31-23
By: John le Carré, and others
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The Russia House
- By: John le Carré
- Narrated by: Michael Jayston
- Length: 13 hrs and 53 mins
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"Glasnost" is on everyone's lips, but the rules of the game haven’t changed for either side. When a beautiful Russian woman foists off a manuscript on an unwitting bystander at the Moscow Book Fair, it's a miracle that she flies under the Soviets' radar. Or does she? The woman's source (codename: Bluebird) will trust only Barley Blair, a whiskey-soaked gentleman publisher with a poet's heart.
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Spying is Waiting.
- By Darwin8u on 03-17-13
By: John le Carré
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A Small Town in Germany
- By: John le Carré
- Narrated by: Michael Jayston
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From the New York Times best-selling author of A Legacy of Spies. "Haven't you realized that only appearances matter"? The British Embassy in Bonn is up in arms. Her Majesty's financially troubled government is seeking admission to Europe's Common Market just as anti-British factions are rising to power in Germany. Rioters are demanding reunification, and the last thing the Crown can afford is a scandal. Then Leo Harting - an embassy nobody - goes missing with a case full of confidential files.
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Recollects the Tension, Jingoism and Polarization
- By Scott Hammond on 06-09-15
By: John le Carré
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John le Carré Value Collection
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Night Manager: Enter the new world of post-Cold War espionage. Penetrate the secret world of ruthless arms dealers and drug smugglers who have risen to unthinkable power and wealth. Our Game: With the Cold War fought and won, British spymaster Tim Cranmer accepts early retirement to rural England and a new life with his alluring young mistress, Emma.... Tailor of Panama: Le Carre's Panama is a Casablanca without heroes, a hotbed of drugs, laundered money and corruption. It is also the country which on December 31, 1999, will gain full control of the Panama Canal.
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you want to know what I think?
- By Anniebligh on 11-24-14
By: John le Carré
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Agent Running in the Field
- A Novel
- By: John le Carré
- Narrated by: John le Carré
- Length: 9 hrs and 33 mins
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Nat, a 47 year-old veteran of Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service, believes his years as an agent runner are over. He is back in London with his wife, the long-suffering Prue. But with the growing threat from Moscow Centre, the office has one more job for him. Nat is to take over The Haven, a defunct substation of London General with a rag-tag band of spies. The only bright light on the team is young Florence, who has her eye on Russia Department and a Ukrainian oligarch with a finger in the Russia pie.
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Who writes “unlistenable etc. “
- By Thomas on 11-02-19
By: John le Carré
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A Perfect Spy
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Over the course of his seemingly irreproachable life, Magnus Pym has been all things to all people: a devoted family man, a trusted colleague, a loyal friend - and the perfect spy. But in the wake of his estranged father's death, Magnus vanishes, and the British Secret Service is up in arms. Is it grief, or is the reason for his disappearance more sinister? And who is the mysterious man with the sad moustache who also seems to be looking for Magnus? In A Perfect Spy, John le Carré has crafted one of his crowning masterpieces.
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Remembrances of loyalties past
- By Darwin8u on 04-13-13
By: John le Carré
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A Private Spy
- The Letters of John le Carré
- By: John le Carré, Tim Cornwell - editor
- Narrated by: David Harewood, Florence Pugh
- Length: 16 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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The never-before-seen correspondence of John le Carré, one of the most important novelists of our generation, is collected in this beautiful volume. During his lifetime, le Carré wrote numerous letters to writers, spies, politicians, artists, actors and public figures. This collection is a treasure trove, revealing the late author's humor, generosity, and wit—a side of him many listeners have not previously seen.
-
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Truly engrossing from start to finish
- By Dan on 01-31-23
By: John le Carré, and others
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The Russia House
- By: John le Carré
- Narrated by: Michael Jayston
- Length: 13 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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"Glasnost" is on everyone's lips, but the rules of the game haven’t changed for either side. When a beautiful Russian woman foists off a manuscript on an unwitting bystander at the Moscow Book Fair, it's a miracle that she flies under the Soviets' radar. Or does she? The woman's source (codename: Bluebird) will trust only Barley Blair, a whiskey-soaked gentleman publisher with a poet's heart.
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Spying is Waiting.
- By Darwin8u on 03-17-13
By: John le Carré
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A Small Town in Germany
- By: John le Carré
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From the New York Times best-selling author of A Legacy of Spies. "Haven't you realized that only appearances matter"? The British Embassy in Bonn is up in arms. Her Majesty's financially troubled government is seeking admission to Europe's Common Market just as anti-British factions are rising to power in Germany. Rioters are demanding reunification, and the last thing the Crown can afford is a scandal. Then Leo Harting - an embassy nobody - goes missing with a case full of confidential files.
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Recollects the Tension, Jingoism and Polarization
- By Scott Hammond on 06-09-15
By: John le Carré
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The Night Manager
- A Novel
- By: John le Carré
- Narrated by: David Case
- Length: 18 hrs and 27 mins
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John le Carré, the legendary author of sophisticated spy thrillers, is at the top of his game in this classic novel of a world in chaos. With the Cold War over, a new era of espionage has begun. In the power vacuum left by the Soviet Union, arms dealers and drug smugglers have risen to immense influence and wealth. The sinister master of them all is Richard Onslow Roper, the charming, ruthless Englishman whose operation seems untouchable.
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Good book. Get the Michael Jayston version instead
- By David Schafer on 07-28-16
By: John le Carré
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A Delicate Truth
- A Novel
- By: John le Carré
- Narrated by: John le Carré
- Length: 10 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
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.
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I haven't enjoyed a tale this much in many listens
- By connie on 05-10-13
By: John le Carré
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The Secret Life of John le Carre
- By: Adam Sisman
- Narrated by: Sean Barrett
- Length: 4 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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Secrecy came naturally to John le Carré, and there were some secrets that he fought fiercely to keep. Adam Sisman's definitive biography, published in 2015, provided a revealing portrait of this fascinating man; yet some aspects of his subject remained hidden. The Secret Life of John le Carré reveals a hitherto-hidden perspective on the life and work of the spy-turned-author and a fascinating meditation on the complex relationship between biographer and subject. “Now that he is dead,” Sisman writes, “we can know him better.”
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A perfect spite
- By M. Miller on 10-25-23
By: Adam Sisman
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Call for the Dead
- A George Smiley Novel
- By: John le Carré
- Narrated by: Michael Jayston
- Length: 4 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Story
George Smiley is no one's idea of a spy - which is perhaps why he's such a natural. But Smiley apparently made a mistake. After a routine security interview, he concluded that the affable Samuel Fennan had nothing to hide. Why, then, did the man from the Foreign Office shoot himself in the head only hours later? Or did he? The heart-stopping tale of intrigue that launched both novelist and spy, Call for the Dead is an essential introduction to le Carre's chillingly amoral universe.
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Smiley is the spies' spy.
- By Little Buffalo on 10-16-17
By: John le Carré
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Single & Single
- By: John le Carré
- Narrated by: Michael Jayston
- Length: 12 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
A lawyer from the London finance house of Single & Single is shot dead on a Turkish hillside by people with whom he thought he was in business. A children's magician is asked by his bank to explain the unsolicited arrival of more than five million pounds sterling in his young daughter's modest trust. A freighter bound for Liverpool is boarded by Russian coast guards in the Black Sea. The celebrated London merchant venturer "Tiger" Single disappears into thin air.
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The spy who came back to the bank
- By Darwin8u on 03-12-14
By: John le Carré
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The Complete George Smiley Radio Dramas
- BBC Radio 4 Full-Cast Dramatisation
- By: John le Carré
- Narrated by: full cast, Simon Russell Beale
- Length: 18 hrs and 59 mins
- Original Recording
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The complete collection of acclaimed BBC Radio dramas based on John le Carré's best-selling novels, starring Simon Russell Beale as George Smiley. With a star cast including Kenneth Cranham, Eleanor Bron, Brian Cox, Ian MacDiarmid, Anna Chancellor, Hugh Bonneville and Lindsay Duncan, these enthralling dramatisations perfectly capture the atmosphere of le Carré's taut, thrilling spy novels.
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good reading but can't navigate
- By RB Vancouver on 01-07-17
By: John le Carré
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The Mission Song
- By: John le Carré
- Narrated by: David Oyelowo
- Length: 11 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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Abandoned by his parents, Bruno Salvador has long looked for guidance. He found it in Mr. Anderson of British Intelligence. Working for Anderson in a clandestine facility, Salvo (as he's known) translates intercepted phone calls, bugged recordings, and snatched voice-mail messages. When Anderson sends him to a mysterious island to interpret during a secret conference, Bruno thinks he is helping Britain--but then he hears something he should not have.
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Only a tease, a taunt of le Carré's brilliance
- By Darwin8u on 03-24-15
By: John le Carré
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John le Carré
- The Biography
- By: Adam Sisman
- Narrated by: Michael Page
- Length: 25 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
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In this definitive biography - blessed by John le Carré himself - Adam Sisman reveals the man behind the bestselling persona. In John le Carré, Sisman shines a spotlight on David Cornwell, an expert at hiding in plain sight - "born to lying," he wrote in 2002, "bred to it, trained to it by an industry that lies for a living, practiced in it as a novelist."
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The writer who came in from the cold
- By Shane Whaley on 06-19-16
By: Adam Sisman
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Silverview
- A Novel
- By: John le Carré
- Narrated by: Toby Jones
- Length: 6 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Story
Julian Lawndsley has renounced his high-flying job in the city for a simpler life running a bookshop in a small English seaside town. But only a couple of months into his new career, Julian’s evening is disrupted by a visitor. Edward, a Polish émigré living in Silverview, the big house on the edge of town, seems to know a lot about Julian’s family and is rather too interested in the inner workings of his modest new enterprise.
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Le Carré's SILVERVIEW brings him and us back home
- By Close Listener on 10-14-21
By: John le Carré
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Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and Other George Smiley Stories
- By: John le Carré
- Narrated by: John le Carré
- Length: 12 hrs and 56 mins
- Abridged
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Call for the Dead (Abridged): George Smiley had liked the man and now the man was dead. But why? Fennan was dead with a note by his body saying his career was finished and he couldn’t go on. Smiley decides to investigate – only to uncover a murderous conspiracy with its roots in his own secret wartime past. A Murder of Quality (Abridged): Miss Ailsa Brimley is in a quandary. She's received a peculiar letter from Mrs Stella Rode, saying that she fears her husband is trying to kill her.
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PerfectStoryteller with Perfect Narrator
- By Steve on 07-02-22
By: John le Carré
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The Constant Gardener
- By: John le Carré
- Narrated by: Michael Jayston
- Length: 17 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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Frightening, heartbreaking, and exquisitely calibrated, John le Carré's new novel opens with the gruesome murder of the young and beautiful Tessa Quayle near northern Kenya's Lake Turkana, the birthplace of mankind. Her putative African lover and traveling companion, a doctor with one of the aid agencies, has vanished from the scene of the crime. Tessa's much older husband, Justin, a career diplomat at the British High Commission in Nairobi, sets out on a personal odyssey in pursuit of the killers and their motive.
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Greatest love story of the last fifty years
- By Darwin8u on 06-30-13
By: John le Carré
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The Tailor of Panama
- By: John le Carré
- Narrated by: John le Carré
- Length: 5 hrs and 59 mins
- Abridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Le Carre's Panama is a Casablanca without heroes, a hotbed of drugs, laundered money and corruption. It is also the country which on December 31, 1999, will gain full control of the Panama Canal.
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Not one of Le Carré's best
- By S. Wilson on 03-31-18
By: John le Carré
What listeners say about The Pigeon Tunnel
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall
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Performance
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- Darwin8u
- 09-16-16
A Global Literary Treasure
"if you were reporting on human pain, you had a duty to share it"
- John le Carré, quoting a dictum of Graham Greene, in 'The Pigeon Tunnel"
First, a disclosure, I was given this book by Viking Books. These types of offers I typically refuse. I don't like feeling under obligation to review or even read a book just because it was given to me. I might do it for friends, but even then, I am VERY picky about what I read. I have thousands of unread books and thousands of others I that are on my radar to read. I usually feel a bit like Melville's Bartleby, aroused only to the level of wanting to reply "I would prefer not to.". But this is John le Carré. Anyone who knows me knows I'VE been pimping John le Carré books for years. My goal is to be a le Carré completest by the end of next year (I still have yet to read The Night Manager, The Tailor of Panama, Absolute Friends, Our Game, or The Naive and Sentimental Lover) but there is a sadness that comes with finishing, with having no country left to visit or no book left to read. I, however, own them all. Often multiple copies. So, how could I refuse a free le Carré? Also, so I wouldn't feel completely like I was writing for free books, I also went out to purchase the Audiobook so I could listen to le Carré talk about his own life.
Surprisingly, this is le le Carré's first memoir. That both feels a bit strange and a bit right. First, le Carré is a master at timing and also understands when is the proper point to introduce a character and how much to show. John le Carré, the pen name for David Cornwell, is often reluctant to do interviews (their is a bit about that in this book) and is a bit publicity shy. He isn't Pynchon or Salinger for sure, but the energy of pimping his stuff and his reluctance sometimes to delve into the narrative of his own life (he worked for awhile for both MI-5 and MI-6) and his relationship with his father seems to be something he is often reluctant to discuss. Ironically, these two issues feed his fiction heavily. His father and his relationship with his father's ghost seems to push through most of his fiction. So, too, obviously does le Carré time as David Cornwell the spy. There is a thin, unbleached muslin shroud between fact and fiction (le Carré talks about his in this book). Perhaps le Carré's greatest book, A Perfect Spy, which Philip Roth (yes, that Philip F'ing Roth) once called "the best English novel since the War" was grown out of David Cornwell's relationship with his own father.
The memoir itself is filled with anecdotes and loosely goes from past to present, but also breaks time's arrow to describe certain relationships with certain people or movies made of his books. I loved especially the parts of this book where le Carré writes about Graham Greene and the craft of writing. I knew le Carré got around, but after reading the memoir, I can safely say he belongs with George Orwell, Graham Greene, William T. Vollmann, Paul Theroux family of adventure writers whose fiction is informed from the trenches. They don't just know where some bodies are actually buried, they may have seen the corpse AND the murder.
So, why only four stars? Because I'm judging this book against his best fiction. This is a fun memoir and a very good le Carré. Again, going back to how this is his first memoir, I wonder why now? I hope he is not done with fiction. I hope this is not him saying, I'm done. He is in his 80s, and after he is done, I'm not sure what to do. We have been waiting for 400 years for another playwright to equal Shakespeare. How many centuries will we have to wait for another le Carré. Dear GOD, I fear too long.
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- Mark Hancock
- 11-19-16
A wonderful reader from a favorite author
John LeCarre is the only author to whom I've written a fan letter, though it was never sent. He manages to entwine action, intrigue, deeply woven plots and complex character with such lyrical prose that at times over the years I would have to stop and just take a breath at such a powerful line, or paragraph, or concept. His biography is no exception, & listening to his narration made the book that much more enjoyable. My hope- shared, I'm sure- is that this beautiful mind continues to flourish for many, many more years. A wonderful book, and magnificent performance.
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- garyyac
- 11-07-16
Disappointing
Le Carre is one of my favorite authors and I have read literally all his books, I am pretty sure. But this loose collection of memoirs is pretty dull stuff. Turns out that an author I truly adore is a boring windbag as a raconteur. Not sure where all the 5 star reviews came from, but I have a feeling that some of his other fans are giving him a pass on this one.
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- Jean
- 11-05-16
Engaging
This autobiography/memoir by John Le Carré is a series of short stories told from memory. He also states in the book the following: “I’m a liar…born to lying, bred to it, trained to it by an industry that lies for a living, practiced in it as a novelist. As a maker of fictions, I invent versions of myself.”
Le Carré tells of being inducted into MI5, as a junior officer in 1956, at the age of 25. He moved to MI6 in 1961 and left the service at age 33. Le Carré tells of friendships with poets, politicians, pies, actors and crooks around the world. Some of the stories are humorous. Some of the names he drops are Nobel Winner Joseph Brodsky, Yasser Arafat, Kim Philby to name a few. The author tells of an unhappy childhood and he did not get along with his parents. Le Carré also provides some information about writing, which I found interesting and insightful.
The book, of course, is well written. I was disappointed that the book was so light weight and insubstantial. But on the other hand, I always enjoy reading Le Carré.
Le Carré narrates his own book which is a delightful treat.
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- Conyers Davis
- 09-23-16
Le Carre should narrate all is books!
A wonderful memoir - more a collections of vignettes from the authors life and work than a chronological biography. But the stand out for me is what a terrific narrator John Le Carre is. I hope he will consider narrating all his books.
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- Adam Shields
- 11-13-17
Memories from a great novelist
John le Carré (the pen name for novelist David John Moore Cornwell) has had a long career. He turned 86 last week, but started writing in the late 1950s. He most recent novel, a sequel to The Spy Who Came In From the Cold was released in September.
Part of what interested me from the reviews of The Pigeon Tunnel was how le Carré knowingly plays with the idea of memory. Several places he suggests that his recounting is what he remembers, but then comments that others remember the situation differently.
In one of the later chapters, mostly about his father, he says that he paid two investigators to give background on his father. He wanted to write his memory of events and then have the ‘actual’ events as recounted by the investigators on a corresponding page to show the difference. The investigators were not able to find the level of detail that he needed to carry that idea out. But that hint of how le Carré views memory and reality give a sense of what he was trying to do in this memoir.
Le Carré can tell a story. As I was reading or listening (I alternated back and forth between Kindle and Audiobook with le Carré narrating the audiobook), I was almost always engaged. But I would put it down and not be super excited to pick it up again. So I spent several weeks working through The Pigeon Tunnel.
As with almost every memoir there are people and stories that are mentioned that hold great importance to the author that do not quite get communicated to the reader. Some of the name dropping went completely over my head.
But I thought the end of The Pigeon Tunnel was especially good. His discussion of his father (a con man who spent time in jail and was wanted in many countries) was particularly insightful and interesting. That led to a discussion about his own education being covered at one point by a rich friend because his mother disappeared when he was a child and his father was unreliable (and a crook). Because of the friend loaning him the money, le Carré was able to finish his education and get the job in the intelligence world which led to him become a novelist. In a similar way, le Carré connects a story of him helping someone else to become a doctor by loaning him the money for his education. Those types of stories about how we are related, matter. Le Carré’s stories are often cynical, but not everything about him is cynical.
In the end, I am glad I picked up The Pigeon Tunnel. There are a number of stories that show where inspiration for a character or a scene or a book came from. Many of those books I have not yet read. But I am inspired to pick up more of his books. That being said, I think for many people, I would recommend his novels over this memoir. If you have not read many, or any, of John le Carré’s novels, I would recommend you start there, probably with The Spy Who Came in from the Cold. For those that have read many of his novels, this is probably worth picking up.
AUDIBLE 20 REVIEW SWEEPSTAKES ENTRY
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- Jamie Todd Rubin
- 11-18-16
The memoir of a seasoned writer, traveler, and spy
I’d never read anything by Le Carré, a.k.a. David John Moore Cornwell before. I’d seen the movie Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, but beyond that I knew nothing of Le Carré. The description of this memoir caught my attention, and that, plus the fact that Le Carré himself narrated the audiobook version convinced me to give it a try. I’m glad I did.
The book reads like a dinner conversation with the author. He spins stories of his life that are fascinating, regardless of the subject. And the subjects vary widely, from his days working in MI6, to meetings with famous world leaders, and celebrities, to his search for understanding his father’s behaviors. Some of the stories are laugh-out-loud funny, but all of them were interesting. It was also interesting how Le Carré often tied the stories he told to the novels he wrote, or the characters in the novels he wrote.
In many ways, The Pigeon Tunnel reminded me of a British version of James Michener’s Tales From the South Pacific, the stories taking place Europe, Asia, the Mideast, and Africa, instead of the South Pacific. But the flavor of the stories had a similar feel.
That Le Carré narrated the book himself lent it an authority and authenticity that made the book all the more enjoyable. I was surprised and delighted by this one.
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- Mark Stanton
- 09-12-16
the master in his own voice looks back
Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?
JLC provides the back stories to many of his novels (real-life characters who inspired his fictional characters such as Leamas, Smiley, and others). Also, his travels and the research underlying some of the stories are discussed. Many amusing anecdotes re: meeting various luminaries such as the British PM McMillan, the president of Italy, Fritz Lang and various encounters with the movie industry.
Who was your favorite character and why?
the author himself and the author's father
Which character – as performed by John le Carré – was your favorite?
Mrs Thatcher
Any additional comments?
A must for all
Le Carre devotees!
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- Paul Frandano
- 09-02-20
Great Writer, Brilliant Raconteur...
...and a superb, confidently secure narrator, at age 84, of his own texts, replete with an impressive array of accents, British and foreign. Don't expect much on his brief stints with MI5 and MI6, but David Cornwell has certainly lived an interesting life, and his anecdotal tales from that life are very often backstories to his espionage thrillers. If you've read many or all of them, you're a fan, and you'll almost certainly find this book richly rewarding. Manybofnhese stories are doozies, including the chapter "Richard Burton needs me." You'll also want to read, or hear, the longest chapter, near the back of the book, about his parents, but most importantly, his charming, charismatic con man of a father, Ronnie, whom you may already have encountered in Cornwell's partly autobiogaphical novel, A Perfect Spy, as Rick Pym, father of Magnus Pym. Heartbreaking, with a killer concluding para.
If given the choice between simply reading it and listening to it, take the audio. Mr. Cornwell is the kind of old gentleman on the neighborhood you'd like to stop by for tea or a wee dram and conversation. A most engaging and humane book.
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- J. Bergeron
- 09-13-17
Great
What an amazing life and career. John le Carre narrates his own book beautifully. So distinguished. However, I got bored about half-way through and never finished it.
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