THE IPCRESS FILE by Len Deighton
Free with The Times on Monday, March 12
THE COLD WAR SPY THRILLER of the second half of the 20th century is unique: a whole body of fiction inextricably linked to a set of geopolitical circumstances that lasted barely 50 years. Spy thrillers began as brutal, hard-nosed adventure yarns and metamorphosed on the page and in screen adaptations into action epics laden with gadgetry, sexy spoofs and, eventually, guilt-laden psychological dramas.
Three novels stand out. One is Ian Fleming’s Casino Royale, which, it could be argued, started it all back in 1953 and gave the world the character of James Bond, even if all the trappings normally associated with him took another decade.
Another is John le Carr?’s Tinker,