Written by John le Carre
Year of Publication: 2013
"Operation Wildlife" is a top secret mission engineered by Fergus Quinn, an ambitious politician in the British Foreign Office, and Ethical Outcomes, an American private defense contractor to capture a high-ranking terrorist arms-buyer in Gibraltar. It is so secret that not even Quinn's private secretary Toby Bell is cleared for it.
On paper the mission is a complete success but, three years later, Bell discovers some disturbing secrets about what happened in Gibraltar. Slowly uncovering the mess of death, corruption and ruined lives that Operation Wildlife left in it's wake, Bell finds himself torn between his duty to the Service and his conscience.
John le Carre rose to fame in the early 1960s with Cold War spy thrillers such as The Spy Who Came in From the Cold (1963), The Looking Glass War (1965), Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (1974) and Smiley's People (1979). As the Cold War thawed in the late 1980s and 1990s, le Carre seemed to struggle to find a subject, but that has recently changed. His latest books deal passionately and angrily with the modern world of surveillance and espionage.
This novel is a gripping and chilling suspense tale which, as always with le Carre is beautifully written. His books are complex and take their time to build. His characters usually stiff, posh British spies or civil servants inhabiting a world of country estates, gentlemen's clubs, offices in Whitehall, lonely hotel rooms and casual betrayal.
