George Smiley is crossing the Atlantic in a new thriller, The Taper Man, written by Nick Harkaway, who is continuing the fictional world of his late father, John le Carré.

The book sends the unobtrusive British spymaster to the US in 1965, hunting a Soviet agent while navigating a culture clash with “The Cousins,” le Carré's fictionalised CIA .

Its title points to a deep-cover operative abandoned when a spy ring is broken up, left to wait quietly for new orders.

Cold War tensions with modern parallels ripple through The Taper Man . Britain is wracked with anxiety about national decline, Russians are meddling, and relations are strained with the U.K.'s American cousins.

Harkaway says writing a Cold War story in 2026 is like “writing in the mirror.” He said the global situation is “weirdly the same in some slightly alarming ways, it’s weirdly different in some alarming ways.” And “many of the same discussions are carrying on.”

The Taper Man is Harkaway's second le Carré book since his father's death in…