Viking to publish 'exhilarating' new le Carré novel in 2019

Viking is publishing a new novel next year by John le Carré, Agent Running in the Field.

Following his 2017 novel A Legacy of Spies, le Carré has turned his attention to the present in Agent Running in the Field. Set in London in 2018, it promises to be "an exhilarating novel that confronts the division and rage at the heart of our modern world" and will be published as a £20 hardback on 17th October 2019.

According to le Carré’s publishers at Viking, the book's plot follows a 26-year-old solitary figure who, "in a desperate attempt to resist the new political turbulence swirling around him, makes connections that will take him down a very dangerous path".

Mary Mount, his editor, said furthermore that the book proved le Carré "the greatest chronicler of our age". "In his plot and characterisation le Carré is as thrilling as ever and in the way he writes about our times he proves himself, once again, to be the greatest chronicler of our age. At a moment like this we need writers like him," she said.

Viking acquired UK and Commonwealth rights from Jonny Geller at Curtis Brown.

Agent Running in the Field will be le Carré’s 25th novel, after his debut Call for the Dead published in 1961. His work became particularly well known following the BBC's adaptation of The Night Manager, which won two Emmy awards and three Golden Globes. In September of this year, his entire works became available in Penguin Modern Classics for the first time, and in October this year, his 1983 novel, The Little Drummer Girl, was brought out as a six-part BBC television series.

Le Carré has sold 3.55 million books for £26.7m through Nielsen since 1998, with The Constant Gardener his bestseller at 330,688 copies sold. A Legacy of Spies, published last year, has so far sold 132,507 in paperback and 107,115 in hardback, heralding his biggest ever hardback bestseller in the Nielsen BookScan era.