10 Greatest John le Carré Books, Ranked

Ian Fleming may have originated the genre, but John le Carré (David Cornwell) transformed it, trading gadgets and derring-do for blurred loyalties, inner turmoil and disillusionment. His novels strip the spy myth piece by piece, presenting intelligence work as a slow grind of paperwork, betrayal, ideological decay and emotional damage.

This ranking gathers his most powerful books, noted for rich commentary, careful plotting and psychological depth. Selections range from the deceptively quiet A Murder of Quality, which uses an elite school to expose class and institutional rot, to the humane The Russia House with its late-Cold War romance; from the post-Cold War corruption of The Night Manager to the elegiac Smiley’s People and the sprawling, morally confused The Honourable Schoolboy.

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