Funeral in Berlin

Description

A Russian scientist defects to the West in this vintage spy thriller, part of The IPCRESS File series 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.

Len Deighton was born in 1929 in London. He did his national service in the RAF, went to the Royal College of Art and designed many book jackets, including the original UK edition of Jack Kerouac's On the Road. The enormous success of his first spy novel, The IPCRESS File (1962), was repeated in a remarkable sequence of books over the following decades. These varied from historical fiction (Bomber, perhaps his greatest novel) to dystopian alternative fiction (SS-GB) and a number of brilliant non-fiction books on the Second World War (Fighter, Blitzkrieg and Blood, Tears and Folly). His spy novels chart the twists and turns of Britain and the Cold War in ways which now give them a unique flavour. They preserve a world in which Europe contains many dictatorships, in which the personal can be ruined by the ideological and where the horrors of the Second World War are buried under only a very thin layer of soil. Deighton's fascination with technology, his sense of humour and his brilliant evocation of time and place make him one of the key British espionage writers, alongside John Buchan, Eric Ambler, Ian Fleming and John Le Carre.

A ferociously cool fable. * New York Times * A most impressive book in which the tension, more like a chronic ache than a sharp stab of pain, never lets go. * Evening Standard * Deighton's fiction has stood the test of time. His habitually acerbic narrative voice still has much to say to contemporary readers ... Now a fresh generation have the chance to sample Deighton's wares as Penguin republishes many of his books. -- Vanessa Thorpe * The Observer * Like lying back in a hot bath with a large malt whisky - absolute bliss. * Sunday Telegraph * Len Deighton's spy novels are so good they make me sad the Cold War is over. -- Malcolm Gladwell Len Deighton is the Flaubert of the contemporary thriller writers. -- Michael Howard * Times Literary Supplement * The self-conscious cool of Deighton's writing has dated in the best way possible ... Stone-cold Cold War classic. -- Toby Litt * The Guardian *