A most wanted man

John le Carré

Ed. Simon&Schuster, 2008

First book by John le Carré I have ever read, so I knew almost nothing about his style and thus it got me in surprise. I expected a classic spy plot, a short novel plenty of mystery and full of abrupt twists. Therefore I was not shocked by the smell of something known, of something already read before the first chapters spread. This feeling was reinforced by the tricky title of the book that suggested that it was all about a young mysterious, enigmatic, ragged, chechenian, skinny and allegedly muslim worshipper, Issa, that sneaks into Hamburg. All of this remind me of Ken Foller’s bestseller The key to Rebecca, where a nazy spy managed to enter Cairo during WWII and an english counterintelligence official began to look for him.

So it seemed to me that the book was almost finished from its very beginning. I could not be more wrong. Soon Issa’s presence in this town disrupts the otherwise unlikely linked lives of very different people: Melik, young turkish boxing champion, and Leyla, his recently widowed mother, who give Issa shelter despite the suspicions of Melik; Tommy Brue, president of Brue Frères PLC bank, who is demanded to issue him the generous inheritance his father, a heartless russian Colonel, achieved after a long life of stealing, murdering and raping innocent chechenians and then have it laundered at Frères by Tommy’s father on hidden accounts knicknamed Lizipanners after the Spanish riding school horses at Vienna; Annabel Ritcher, a young and idealistic lawyer of Sanctuary North, a charitable christian foundation for protecting displaced people, and personal counsel of the lean russian refugee, who helps him claiming the money from Tommy Brue; and finally, Günther Bachman, an old sharp german spy with no academic qualification, but nevertheless largely skilled by the time expended in a big deal of missions all over the world, and his team (Erna Frey, his faithfull assistant, Maximiliam, stammerer hacker and Niki, Maximiliam’s girlfriend from audio section). Any of this people see Issa’s from their own biased point of view and thus treat him accordance to it: as a poor muslism, a doubtful client, a wrecked refugee or a internationally watched chechenian terrorist. And without one noticing it, the author subtlety changes completely the point of the novel: the story is no longer about a plain seek of a suspect but about a sharp criticism to modern world’s picture. A narrative where uncertainties, suspicions, fear to the extranger, specially if it is poor and muslim, governments control of everyone’s privacy, joined to a marked inefficiency of their intelligence services to catch up terrorist group’s way of doing, leave few room to optimism, idealism and well-meaning.

A dark painting, like a Goya’s work, where the author gives few clues to the reader, where the main characters are not deeply drawn, just a few brush strokes and the reader has to fill the gaps left. As long as I have read about le Carré, this seems to be his trademark, his style.

As an english learner I have found the plot of the book easy to follow, but I feel I have not fully understood the nuances all critics praise about.