Agent Palmer

Normally it is possible to argue with an inside dust jacket quote, but in this case, it’s improbable. “Spy Sinker is the crescendo climax of the six previous bestselling novels by Len Deighton–and it ties them all together.” Spy Sinker is the culmination of the six previous novels, but it’s so much more than that. In a way, Berlin Game, Mexico Set, London Match, Winter, Spy Hook, and Spy Line are the dots plotted on a graph in the Bernard…

The first book in the second Bernard Samson trilogy feels much more serialized than the start of a trilogy. I wouldn’t suggest that you start with Spy Hook; however, it is the beginning of a compelling arc that provides more information for your personal dossier of Bernard Samson.

Winter: A Novel of a Berlin Family by Len Deighton is a familial masterpiece. Starting with Harald Winter and focusing on his two sons, Peter and Paul Winter, this novel follows the family’s journey as their spouses and friends are all intertwined in chaotic and random events as history unfolds with World War I and World War II.

London Match, the final piece in the first trilogy centered on Bernard Samson, does well to both stand on its own and build off of its predecessors, Berlin Game and Mexico Set. As expected, author Len Deighton delivers everything you could ever want in spy fiction with the bonus of Bernard Samson being, well, Bernard Samson!

It’s hard to say anything more than Mexico Set is a brilliant second act to Berlin Game’s first. Deighton picks up the plot where he left off and Samson is perhaps even more relatable in dealing with the aftermath or fallout of that first act.