100,000+ Books, Games & Puzzles in-stock 🇳🇿

🐉 🔥 Happy Threshing Day! Pre-order the Deluxe Edition of Rebecca Yarros' newest release today! 🔥 🐉

Karla's Choice

A John le Carré Novel
4.07 goodreads logo

Ratings/reviews counts are updated frequently.

Check link for latest rating.
( 5,512 ratings, 663 reviews)
Brief Description
A gripping new novel set in the universe of John le Carré's most iconic spy, George Smiley, written by acclaimed novelist Nick Harkaway. It is spring in 1963 and George Smiley has left the Circus. With the wreckage of the West's spy war with the Soviets... Read More
Format: Paperback / softback
$2900
Elsewhere:
$3999
OVERNIGHT NZ-WIDE DELIVERY

Found a better price? Request a price match

Book Hero Magic formatted this description to make it easier to read. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! Description

A gripping new novel set in the universe of John le Carré's most iconic spy, George Smiley, written by acclaimed novelist Nick Harkaway.

It is spring in 1963 and George Smiley has left the Circus. With the wreckage of the West's spy war with the Soviets strewn across Europe, he has eyes only on a more peaceful life. And indeed, with his marriage more secure than ever, there is a rumour in Whitehall—unconfirmed and a little scandalous—that George Smiley might almost be happy.

But Control has other plans. A Russian agent has defected in the most unusual of circumstances, and the man he was sent to kill in London is nowhere to be found. Smiley reluctantly agrees to one last simple task: interview Susanna, a Hungarian émigré and employee of the missing man, and sniff out a lead. But in his absence, the shadows of Moscow have lengthened. Smiley will soon find himself entangled in a perilous mystery that will define the battles to come, and strike at the heart of his greatest enemy...

Set in the missing decade between two iconic instalments in the George Smiley saga, The Spy Who Came in from the Cold and Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Nick Harkaway's Karla's Choice is an extraordinary, thrilling return to the world of spy fiction's greatest writer, John le Carré.

Book Details

INFORMATION

ISBN: 9780241714911

Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd

Format: Paperback / softback

Date Published: 24 October 2024

Country: United Kingdom

Imprint: Viking

Audience: General / adult

DIMENSIONS

Spine width: 20.0mm

Width: 153.0mm

Height: 234.0mm

Weight: 350g

Pages: 320

About the Author

Nick Harkaway (Author) Nick Harkaway was born in Cornwall in 1972. Author of the novels The Gone-Away World, Angelmaker and Tigerman, he lives in London with his wife and two children. John le Carre (Author) John le Carre was born in 1931. For six decades, he wrote novels that came to define our age. The son of a confidence trickster, he spent his childhood between boarding school and the London underworld. At sixteen he found refuge at the University of Bern, then later at Oxford. A spell of teaching at Eton led him to a short career in British Intelligence (MI5 & 6). He published his debut novel, Call for the Dead, in 1961 while still a secret servant. His third novel, The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, secured him a worldwide reputation, which was consolidated by the acclaim for his trilogy, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, The Honourable Schoolboy and Smiley's People. At the end of the Cold War, le Carre widened his scope to explore an international landscape including the arms trade and the War on Terror. His memoir, The Pigeon Tunnel, was published in 2016 and the last George Smiley novel, A Legacy of Spies, appeared in 2017. He died on 12 December 2020. His posthumous novel, Silverview, was published in 2021.

Also by John le Carré

View all
  • The Spy Who Came in from the Cold
    The Spy Who Came in from the Cold by John le Carré was Le Carre's breakthrough work of 1963; an award-winning number one global bestseller that brought him international renown. It redefined the spy story as a gritty and terrible tale of men who are caught up in politics beyond their imagining. Alex Leamas is tired. It's the 1960s, and...
    Paperback
    $2400
    Elsewhere:
    $2600
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
    A beautifully designed new Clothbound Classic of le Carré's masterpiece, published to celebrate the novel's 50th anniversary. A mole, implanted by Moscow Centre, has infiltrated the highest ranks of the British Intelligence Service, almost destroying it in the process. And so former spymaster George Smiley has been brought out of retirement in order to hunt down the traitor at the...
    Hardback
    $4000
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • Smiley's People
    The third and final novel of John le Carré's acclaimed 'Karla Trilogy', Smiley's People, published in Penguin Modern Classics for the first time, transports readers into the intricate world of espionage and Cold War intrigue. When a former agent is found murdered, George Smiley, retired but ever-observant, finds himself pulled back into the shadowy operations of the Secret Service. Despite...
    Paperback
    $2600
    Available
    Ships in 4-6 weeks
  • Silverview
    The much-anticipated publication of John le Carré's last complete novel is now available in paperback. Julian Lawndsley has renounced his high-flying job in the City for a simpler life running a bookshop in a small English seaside town. But after only a couple of months into his new career, Edward, a Polish emigré, shows up at his door with a...
    Paperback
    $2200
    Elsewhere:
    $2400
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • The Night Manager
    In le Carré's first post-Cold War novel, a night manager at a Cairo hotel helps British Intelligence penetrate the secret world of ruthless arms dealers. At the start of it all, Jonathan Pine is merely the night manager at a luxury hotel. But when a single attempt to pass on information to the British authorities—about an international businessman at the...
    Paperback
    $2700
    Elsewhere:
    $3000
    Backorder
    Ships mid August
  • Call for the Dead
    George Smiley becomes tangled in a case of suicide and espionage in le Carré's first novel. After a routine security check by George Smiley, civil servant Samuel Fennan apparently kills himself. When Smiley finds that Circus head Maston is trying to blame him for the man's death, he begins his own investigation, meeting with Fennan's widow to find out what...
    Paperback
    $2300
    Elsewhere:
    $2600
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • The Night Manager
    In le Carré's first post-Cold War novel, an ex-soldier helps British Intelligence penetrate the secret world of ruthless arms dealers. At the start of it all, Jonathan Pine is merely the night manager at a luxury hotel. But when a single attempt to pass on information to the British authorities—about an international businessman at the hotel with suspicious dealings—backfires terribly,...
    Paperback
    $2300
    Elsewhere:
    $2600
    Available
    Ships in 4-6 weeks
  • The Honourable Schoolboy
    The Honourable Schoolboy, the second book in John le Carré's revered 'Karla Trilogy' and a distinguished addition to Penguin Modern Classics, delves deep into the shadowy world of espionage with its gripping and intricate narrative. In the aftermath of a shocking betrayal, the once-mighty British Secret Service is left in shambles, and the responsibility of reviving it falls to George...
    Paperback
    $2400
    Elsewhere:
    $2600
    Available
    Ships in 4-6 weeks
  • The Secret Pilgrim
    A hardback series for le Carre collectors The Cold War is over and Ned has been demoted to the training academy. He asks his old mentor, George Smiley, to address his passing-out class. There are no laundered reminiscences; Smiley speaks the truth - perhaps the last the students will ever hear. As they listen, Ned recalls his own painful triumphs...
    Hardback
    $3400
    Elsewhere:
    $3700
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • Our Kind of Traitor
    Innocents abroad are drawn into the darkest recesses of the financial world in this urgent and electrifying thriller, now in the giftable hardback series. An English couple, Perry and Gail, are taking an off-peak holiday on the Caribbean island of Antigua. By seeming chance they bump into a Russian millionaire called Dima who owns a peninsula and a diamond-encrusted gold...
    Hardback
    $3400
    Elsewhere:
    $3700
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • A Most Wanted Man
    A novel of tremendous political relevance now in the giftable hardback series A half-starved young Russian man in a long black overcoat is smuggled into Hamburg at dead of night. He has an improbable amount of cash secreted in a purse round his neck. He is a devout Muslim. Or is he? He says his name is Issa. Poignant, compassionate,...
    Hardback
    $3400
    Elsewhere:
    $3700
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • A Delicate Truth
    John le Carré takes on counter-terrorism in this furiously paced story of moral dilemma, bold action and unexpected love, now in the giftable hardback series. A counter-terror operation, codenamed Wildlife, is being mounted in Britain's most precious colony, Gibraltar. Its purpose is to capture and abduct a high-value jihadist arms buyer. Its authors are an ambitious Foreign Office Minister and...
    Hardback
    $3400
    Elsewhere:
    $3700
    In Stock
    Ships today

Also by Nick Harkaway

View all
  • Titanium Noir
    'Nick Harkaway novels are electric' Patrick Ness, author of A MONSTER CALLS 'Cross-genre brilliance' William Gibson, author of AGENCY 'Captivating from start to finish' The Big Issue Cal Sounder is a detective working for the police on certain very sensitive cases. So when he's called in to investigate a homicide at a local apartment, he is surprised at first to...
    Paperback
    $2799
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • Karla's Choice
    A gripping new novel set in the universe of John le Carré's most iconic spy, George Smiley, written by acclaimed novelist Nick Harkaway. It is spring in 1963 and George Smiley has left the Circus. With the wreckage of the West's spy war with the Soviets strewn across Europe, he has eyes only on a more peaceful life. And indeed,...
    Paperback
    $2800
    Available
    Ships in 4-6 weeks
  • Sleeper Beach
    '[A] nifty fusion of crime and sci-fi . . . In a novel teeming with memorable characters, Harkaway handles the blend of genres with skill and pizzazz' Sunday TimesFrom the Sunday Times bestselling author of Karla's Choice, comes a thrilling new detective novel.On the shore of a rundown holiday town, a young woman washes up dead. Martha Erskine, the matriarch...
    Paperback
    $2799
    Available
    Ships in 4-6 weeks
  • The Taper Man
    Pre-order
    The Taper Man
    The Taper Man by Nick Harkaway, renowned for his bestselling take on George Smiley, returns with the iconic spy hot on the trail of a traitor at the top of American intelligence. It is 1965, and the Cold War has never been colder. The Circus, the secret centre of British intelligence, has one prized asset left in Moscow: a senior...
    Paperback
    $3299
    Elsewhere:
    $3800
    Pre-order
    Out 10 Nov 2026
  • Sleeper Beach
    From the Sunday Times bestselling author of Karla's Choice, comes a thrilling new detective novel. On the shore of a rundown holiday town, a young woman washes up dead. Martha Erskine, the matriarch of a local dynasty, suspects a member of her own family might be involved in the murder, and calls in Cal to investigate. Cal Sounder is a...
    Hardback
    Sold Out
  • Sleeper Beach
    Cal Sounder is struggling to adapt to life as a Titan, one of society's medically-enhanced elites. When he gets a call to say that an unknown woman has washed up dead in a faded seaside town, he dives back into his former role as a detective. Intriguingly, the call comes from the matriarch of a local dynasty, Martha Erskine, a...
    Paperback
    Sold Out

More from Crime & Thriller

View all
  • New Release
    It Could Have Been Her
    PREPARE TO BE HOOKED: The no. 1 Sunday Times and MULTI-million-copy bestselling author is back with a brand-new spine tingling thriller. It was the night she almost died. Jane Trevally, newly divorced and feeling a little lost, agrees to accompany a man she doesn't know to his house in the darkest corner of Hampstead Heath. She's offered a drink, goes in, and...
    Paperback
    $3000
    Elsewhere:
    $3800
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • New Release
    26 Beauties
    The twenty-sixth thrilling novel in the globally bestselling Women's Murder Club series. Beautiful young women are disappearing by the dozen. A celebration is cut short when a concerned father crashes Detective Inspector Lindsay Boxer's party. His daughter is missing - and she's not the only one. DI Lindsay Boxer has been tracking a chilling pattern: a Jane Doe washed ashore,...
    Paperback
    $3199
    Elsewhere:
    $3800
    (1)
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • New Release
    The Secrets We Hide
    The stunning new North Falls thriller by the bestselling author of We Are All Guilty Here 'Quite simply, Karin Slaughter is the best of us' Dervla McTiernan Welcome back to North Falls -- a small town with big secrets. The house at 1601 Iris Drive looks like any other in the quiet, residential street. But rumours are rife about the Vickery...
    Paperback
    $3099
    Elsewhere:
    $3799
    (1)
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • Hope Rises
    'BALDACCI IS STILL PEERLESS' - THE SUNDAY TIMES REVENGE IS A DISH BEST SERVED COLD . . . Walter Nash, working under the alias of Dillon Hope, is on the road to revenge after becoming an informant for the FBI against a global criminal operation headed up by Victoria Steers. Steers has ripped everything Nash held dear away from him....
    Paperback
    $3099
    Elsewhere:
    $3800
    (1)
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • New Release
    Slash
    A year after a brutal shootout left her lover dead, ex-police sergeant Honey Chalmers is a hot mess, drinking too much and eating too little, working casual gigs for a shady firm of private investigators — while holding conversations with a ghost. A desperate father asks her to investigate his missing son — a double-murder suspect last seen during the...
    Paperback
    $3200
    Elsewhere:
    $3799
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • New Release
    A River Red With Blood
    The players call it the Game, and its aim is simple: to abduct and kill a stranger without getting caught. They're very good at it. They've been playing it for a long time. And they can keep playing as long as everyone sticks to the rules: No Killing Close to Home and No Killing Outside the Game. But those rules...
    Paperback
    $3199
    Elsewhere:
    $3799
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • The Shadow Step
    The new Detective Miller thriller from bestselling author Mark Billingham, full of tension, wit and incredible twists. The Shadow Step: One taken simultaneously by a pair of dancers facing the same direction, one of them behind and slightly shifted leftwards ('in the shadow') Typically, such a step perfectly demonstrates synchronized elegance. It showcases a couple in near telepathic harmony with...
    Paperback
    $3199
    Elsewhere:
    $3799
    Backorder
    Ships mid August
  • New Release
    Some Sort of Justice
    The first time in print for the million-copy-selling crime writer. This time, a cast of good coppers, a wily ex-detective and a shadowy, well-connected operative are brought together by an aristocratic fatality. Only there's no body, no forensics—and enemies in the highest places. When Caroline Thorpe succeeded in casting doubt on the verdict of the inquest into her brother's death,...
    Paperback
    $3199
    Elsewhere:
    $3800
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • The Ending Writes Itself
    Secrets don't stay secret for long in publishing Six authors. One private island. Seventy-two hours to write the ending that will change their lives. ‘This is a house of novelists, not murderers. You dream up crimes. You don’t commit them.’ ‘But a writer has. And so, who better than a writer to catch them?’ World famous author Arthur Fletch is...
    Paperback
    $2800
    Elsewhere:
    $3499
    (2)
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • New Release
    Neighbourhood Watch
    Neighbourhood Watch is a sharp, stylish thriller with a killer opening hook, a generous dose of dark humour, and a truly distinctive voice. ― Christian White The annual Curlew Street scarecrow competition is back, and the residents of Melbourne’s inner north have never seen an entry like it. Shirt bloody, head and arms slumped over a scarecrow crucifix: Victoria’s most...
    Paperback
    $2999
    Elsewhere:
    $3699
    (1)
    In Stock
    Ships today
  • For All the Dead Girls
    Tough and gutsy PI Lou Alcott returns with a terrifyingly gritty new case that takes her deep into the dark web. Perfect for fans of Jacqueline Bublitz and Jane Caro. While juggling a missing person case with unexpected ties close to home and saving an innocent woman and her child from a dangerous domestic situation, Lou ends up in the...
    Paperback
    $2899
    Elsewhere:
    $3499
    (1)
    Available
    Ships in 4-6 weeks
  • Don’t Let Him In
    Prepare to be hooked—the no. 1 Sunday Times and multi-million-copy bestselling author is back with a brand-new, spine-tingling thriller. He's the perfect man. He says he loves you. You think he might even be made for you. Before long he's moved into your house—and into your heart. And then he leaves for days at a time. You don't know where...
    Paperback
    $3200
    Elsewhere:
    $3800
    In Stock
    Ships today

Why buy from us?

Book Hero is not a chain store or big box retailer. We're an independent 100% NZ-owned business on a mission to help more Kiwis rediscover a love of books and reading!

Service & Delivery

Service & Delivery

Our warehouse in Auckland holds over 80,000 books, toys, board games and puzzles in-stock so you're not waiting for your order to arrive from overseas.

Auckland Bookstore

Auckland Bookstore

We're primarily an online store, but for your convenience you can pick up your order for free from our bookstore, which is right next door to our warehouse in Hobsonville.

Our Gifting Service

Our Gifting Service

Books make wonderful thoughtful gifts and we're here to help with gift-wrapping and cards. We can even send your gift directly to your loved one.