The Ipcress File

<a href="https://shop.penguin.co.uk/collections/book-bundles-modern-classics/?&amp;utm_source=Penguin.co.uk&amp;utm_medium=Linked_text&amp;utm_campaign=Penguin_Modern_Classics_Series_26_06">Choose 3 timeless classics for only £21 over on the Penguin Shop</a>

*NOW A MAJOR NEW TV SERIES* 
 
A high-ranking scientist has been kidnapped. A secret British intelligence agency must find out why. But as the quarry is pursued from grimy Soho to the other side of the world, what seemed a straightforward mission turns into something far more sinister. With its sardonic, cool, working-class hero, Len Deighton's sensational debut The Ipcress File rewrote the spy thriller and became the defining novel of 1960's London. 
 
'Changed the shape of the espionage thriller ... there is an infectious energy about this book which makes it a joy to read' Daily Telegraph

Len Deighton was born in 1929 in London. He did his national service in the RAF, went to the Royal College of Art and designed many book jackets, including the original UK edition of Jack Kerouac's On the Road. The enormous success of his first spy novel, The IPCRESS File (1962), was repeated in a remarkable sequence of books over the following decades. These varied from historical fiction (Bomber, perhaps his greatest novel) to dystopian alternative fiction (SS-GB) and a number of brilliant non-fiction books on the Second World War (Fighter, Blitzkrieg and Blood, Tears and Folly). 
 
His spy novels chart the twists and turns of Britain and the Cold War in ways which now give them a unique flavour. They preserve a world in which Europe contains many dictatorships, in which the personal can be ruined by the ideological and where the horrors of the Second World War are buried under only a very thin layer of soil. Deighton's fascination with technology, his sense of humour and his brilliant evocation of time and place make him one of the key British espionage writers, alongside John Buchan, Eric Ambler, Ian Fleming and John Le Carré.

A high-ranking scientist has been kidnapped. A secret British intelligence agency must find out why. But as the quarry is pursued from grimy Soho to the other side of the world, what seemed a straightforward mission turns into something far more sinister. With its sardonic, cool, working-class hero, Len Deighton's sensational debut The Ipcress File rewrote the spy thriller and became the defining novel of 1960's London.

Only When I Larf

'Dazzling ingenuity and cleverness' Independent 
 
Three con artists are on the make, and making millions. There's Silas, the leader, slick and self-assured; Liz, his glamorous lover; and Bob, the young cockney upstart (who's also falling for Liz). As this uneasy trio's swindles take them from New York high-rises to sixties London, corrupt governments to, finally, the ultimate con in the Middle East, will their luck start to run out? 
 
'For sheer readability he has no peer' Evening Standard

Deighton has shown himself to be the most protean of British best-sellers.

What raises Deighton's genre to art is not only his absorbing characters but his metaphoric grace, droll wit, command of technical detail ... and sure sense of place.

The three confidence tricksters had a style that earned them millions. Silas was the leader, slick and self-assured - but dissatisfied. Bob was the junior partner, longing for the open road where pickings were rich and the living was easy. And Liz, Silas' mistress, was in between. Theirs was a built-in love triangle with its own rewards ... and its own dangers. 
 
In New York these con-artists do a 'business deal' worth millions. But back in London Silas' plan to bilk an emergent African nation misfires. Then Bob takes over the running of the operation - and Liz. A Beirut bank is their target and each member of the trio gets what he or she deserves - each with a twist of lemon.

Declarations of War

'Deighton really is something special' Sunday Times 
 
Len Deighton's only collection of short stories explores the devastating experiences of ordinary soldiers across over two thousand years of war. From Hannibal's march on Rome to the American Civil War, and from a British Hurricane pilot in the Second World War to a modern conflict played out in the Mexican borderlands, each of these stories shows the effects of war on the human character, and how it can lead to extraordinary deeds, both great and terrible. 
 
'Len Deighton is a fearless observer of the deceptive human world' John Gray

A collection of thirteen stories that offer an inside view of fighting men poised at the edge of death. 
 
Len Deighton's only collection of shorter fiction, this dazzling array of stories spans twenty-three centuries of warfare. 
 
From Hannibal's march on Rome - when strange, moving objects terrorise the troops of one of the toughest and most skilful armies in history - to the efforts of a belittled Civil War general to get his men to face the Confederate army; to the dawn skies above an artillery-blasted French battle-line where a dogfight unfolds, to Vietnam; where two lost American soldiers stumble across an abandoned military airfield. 
 
Each story in Declarations of War explores the effects of war upon man's character, how it pushes him to act in a dehumanized, machine-like way, often leading to extraordinary deeds, both good and ill. It portrays human conflict through a series of devastating experiences and shows how great deeds are often but the smallest thread in the large fabric of war.

Violent Ward

'Superbly edgy. Entertaining, full of good one-liners' Sunday Times 
 
Downtown LA. Streetwise lawyer Mickey Murphy has a shabby office in a low-rent district, an ex who bleeds him dry and the kind of clients who would plead the Fifth if they could count that high. He's also been bought out by millionaire tycoon Zach Petrovitch - who just happens to be married to the love of Mickey's life. When she asks him for help, Mickey finds himself thrown into a world of Hollywood stars, shady schemes, riots - and murder. 
 
'Crime at its most entertaining, filled with lively dialogue' Sunday Telegraph 
'Deighton's ear for dialogue and eye for lunatic California are perfect' Sunday Express

If America is a lunatic asylum, then California is the Violent Ward. 
 
Mickey Murphy is a criminal lawyer with an office in LA's downtown low-rent district, an ex-wife who bleeds him for money and 'clients who would plead the Fifth Amendment if they could count that high'. To make matters worse, Mickey finds himself embroiled against his wishes in an elaborate and clever scam that's going askew, and being interrogated by the LAPD about a brutal murder. 
 
With an observant eye and ear for the California 'scene', Deighton once again uses his brilliant storytelling skills to propel an exciting and suspenseful narrative at breakneck speed to a dramatic climax in a riot-torn city.

City of Gold

'A superb example of Deighton's craft' Robert Harris 
 
January 1942. Rommel's troops are at the gates of Egypt, soon to threaten Cairo itself. A spy has been leaking British secrets to the German commander, and Captain Albert Cutler has been sent to find them amongst the city's teeming streets and bazaars, before it is too late. But Cutler is not quite what he seems, and Cairo is a city of fool's gold, where nothing can be taken at face value. 
 
'The pace of the story is compulsive ... it is a real pleasure to be swallowed up in Deighton's descriptions of wartime Cairo' Daily Telegraph 
'A novel reminiscent in spirit to Casablanca. Play it again, Len' Kirkus Reviews

The pace of the story is compulsive ... it is a real pleasure to be swallowed up in Deighton's description of wartime Cairo.

The hallmarks of a Deighton novel are an intricate plot, an easy grasp of detail and a total mastery of storytelling technique.

January 1942. Rommel's seemingly invincible Afrika Korps is at the gates of Egypt - perhaps soon to threaten Cairo itself. 
 
And Rommel has a spy in the city - a source so well-informed that the German commander knows in advance every movement of the allied forces. 
 
Amongst the teeming streets and bazaars, the British, led by Major Albert Cutler, must find him. But Cairo is a city of fool's gold, where nothing and nobody, not even Cutler, can be taken at face value...

MAMista

'A superb novel ... you will be hooked from the first chapter and enjoy every line' Sunday Express 
 
Deep in the South American jungle the MAMista Marxist revolutionaries are fighting a hopeless, protracted war against a dictator - while the CIA see an opportunity. Amid the turmoil, three very different people - a doctor, a young firebrand and an educated revolutionary - find themselves thrown together and trapped at the heart of a battle where the enemy is uncertain, and there can be no winners. Len Deighton's first post-Cold War novel is a chilling and compelling story of revolution and betrayal. 
 
'Moral ambiguity used to be called Greeneland. Since Graham Greene's death, at least part of it ought to be renamed Deightonsville' Time Magazine

Deighton's longest, most complex and passionate novel in years: an epic tale, set in a South American jungle, of good men and women crushed beneath the heel of Realpolitik.

You will be hooked from the first chapter and enjoy every line ... The Berlin Wall may have tumbled, destroying overnight a whole spy cottage industry, but as the dust settles Len Deighton rises like the phoenix ... a superb novel.

Moral ambiguity used to be called Greeneland. Since Graham Greene's death, that territory is open for conquest. At least part of it ought to be renamed Deightonsville.

Deep in Marxist Guerilla territory a hopeless war is being fought. 
 
The Berlin Wall is demolished. Marx is dead. Try telling that to Ramon and his desperate men hiding in the jungle cradling their AK 47s, dusting off the slabs of Semtex and dreaming of world revolution. 
 
MAMista takes us to the dusty, violent capital of Spanish Guiana in South America, and thence into the depths of the rain forest. There, four people become caught up in a struggle both political and personal, a struggle corrupted by ironies and deceits, and riddled with the accidents of war. They are four people who never should have found themselves bound together in a mission for revolution, which may be the sentence of death. 
 
Never has Deighton portrayed so accurately the terror and the tedium of war, or the shifting alliances and betrayals between people who have nothing to lose but their lives.

Len Deighton

Len Deighton is the Flaubert of the contemporary thriller writers.

Deighton's best book ... an absorbingly exciting spy story that is also a fascinating exercise in might-have-been speculation.

Horrifyingly plausible.

They don't, as they say, write them like this anymore. You will be entertained, informed, thrilled and dazzled. Long may he, and his creations, live on.

It is 1941 and Germany has won the war. Britain is occupied, Churchill executed and the King imprisoned in the Tower of London. At Scotland Yard, Detective Inspector Archer tries to do his job and keep his head down. But when a body is found in a Mayfair flat, what at first appears to be a routine murder investigation sends him into a world of espionage, deceit and betrayal.

Len Deighton

Praise for SS-GB

Len Deighton is the Flaubert of the contemporary thriller writers.

Deighton's best book ... an absorbingly exciting spy story that is also a fascinating exercise in might-have-been speculation.

Horrifyingly plausible.

Len Deighton is the Flaubert of the contemporary thriller writers.

Deighton's best book ... an absorbingly exciting spy story that is also a fascinating exercise in might-have-been speculation.

Horrifyingly plausible.

Len Deighton is the Flaubert of the contemporary thriller writers.

Deighton's best book ... an absorbingly exciting spy story that is also a fascinating exercise in might-have-been speculation.

Horrifyingly plausible.

Books by Len Deighton

Follow penguin

Follow ladybird

Follow puffin

Sign up to the Penguin newsletter