Single & Single.

LE CARRE, John .

Item Number: 109991

London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1999.

First edition of this “exciting spy story” (New York Times Book Review). Octavo, original boards. Presentation copy, inscribed by the author on title page to a fellow writer in the month of publication, “For Maria Perry, with my best-  John le Carre 28/iii/99.” Fine in a near fine dust jacket with light shelfwear.

In Single & Single, le Carré masterfully establishes a sequence of events whose connections are mysterious, complex and compelling. He tells of corrupt liaisons between criminal elements in the new Russian states and the world of legitimate finance in the West. He also paints an intimate portrait of two families: one Russian, the other English; one trading illicit goods, the other laundering the profits; one betrayed by a son-in-law, the other betrayed, and redeemed, by a son.