The Spy Who Came In From The Cold

...By Its Cover, Vol. 1, No. 2

In this snow day edition of …By Its Cover, I review Thy Spy Who Came In From The Cold, by John Le Carre¹. Because of the vast number of book recommendations on Substack, and only so many hours in the day, there is no chance I will ever have time to actually read them all, so I am left with the only rational option left: to judge books by their cover.

The story involves an American CIA informant, George Smiley, who is working in a small specialty bicycle shop in Finland. The shop is suspected of being a front for exotic metal alloys that could benefit the Soviet Union. The other shop workers quickly suspect Smiley of being a spy, because (1) fitting of his name, Smiley is a happy chatty guy in a typically austere Finnish culture, (2) when he tries to speak Finnish, he sounds like the Swedish Chef from the Muppets, and (3) he routinely wears a windbreaker with an American Flag patch on the arm and the letters CIA in bold print on the back. To sabotage him, the shift manager swaps slick racing tires onto George’s bicycle, leading to a terrible crash on the icy roads, coincidentally on his 50^th wedding anniversary. The tale comes to a thrilling conclusion, but I will avoid any spoilers for now. Suffice it to say that it was so suspenseful, you don’t even notice the lack of ninjas.

The plot may sound ridiculous to many, but it so happens that my Father-in-law once worked for a bicycle shop in Florida that was questioned by the FBI about certain titanium bicycle frames, so I can very much relate to this story. On the second consecutive snow day in these parts, this is the perfect novel for curling up under a blanket and not actually reading.

My overall rating: 8/10

1. I was wary of anything by this author, because I watched the film Tinker, Tailor, Solder, Spy, and somehow, I knew even less about the plot after watching the movie than when I started.