I finished Karla’s Choice this morning. Quite a good read! It had all of the strengths and weaknesses of Le Carré at his best. It benefitted from being a conscious recreation of the Smiley era, as opposed to some of the later JLC books, which were hit and miss. If the author failed in any respects to recreate his father’s style, it was that this book actually had an action sequence (which are almost entirely absent in JLC’s other books), and frankly, it was easier to follow than most of JLC’s, despite being appropriately convoluted!
One aspect I read in a review that I agree with is that women – Susanna, Ann, and Connie – are more convincingly portrayed by Nick Harkaway than John Le Carre. It’s true that JLC – like Mordecai Richler, Robertson Davies, Stephen King and many other of my favourite male authors – struggles with feminine voices.
I have some spoiler-heavy questions however:
“Karla’s choice” refers to Karla's decision to kill his own father rather than submit to being forced into defection/collaboration with the British by Smiley. In the denouement, Smiley locates Karla’s father Bogdan in Portugal and conveys to Karla via the Soviet agent in Paris that if Karla wishes to meet and discuss things – understood to mean coming over to the British – he should meet him at a café near where his father keeps his boat. When Karla fails to turn up, Smiley goes to capture Bogdan but he’s too late – Karla has been there already and killed him, to protect his own secret identity, and therefore his status and power within the Thirteenth Directorate.
But as with any other Le Carré tale, there were other things that continue to be unclear to me. Why was Karla so concerned that his identity would be revealed? Was it because didn’t want others to know his father had been a White Russian? Also, why did the original hitman Karla sent to bump off Banati (Roka) at the start of the novel decide not to do so? The explanation was pretty thin; he has a change of heart because he wants to be an actor (!) and thinks Susanna is an angel or something? The book would benefit from a re-reading but I’m not sure whether it has the intellectual heft to justify that.
Anyway, all around enjoyable and I bet you five bucks Harkaway will write more of them.
by djburnoutb