Berlin Game - Len Deighton (1st Edition, Hutchinson, 1983)

This Hutchinson first edition (1983) is of interest to collectors of Len Deighton first editions, Cold War spy fiction, and the Bernard Samson series.

About: A very good first edition in original dust jacket. The jacket is bright and unfaded with the bold apple-and-knife cover illustration in excellent colour; light shelf wear to the edges and a small nick to the top of the rear panel. Boards tight and square in black cloth. Interior pages cream and clean throughout. The rear panel carries the striking promotional quote - "The Poet of the Spy Story" (Julian Symons, Sunday Times) - intact and legible. A handsome copy of a highly collectible title.

Details:

• Title: Berlin Game
• Author: Len Deighton
• Publisher: Hutchinson & Co. (Publishers) Ltd, London
• Publication Date: 1983
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Binding: Hardcover in original dust jacket
• Condition: Very Good
• Dust Jacket Condition: Very Good

Synopsis: First edition Hutchinson imprint in original dust jacket; the opening volume of Deighton's acclaimed Bernard Samson trilogy, a cornerstone of Cold War spy fiction and highly desirable for Deighton collectors and bibliophiles of the genre.

Review: Len Deighton's Berlin Game (1983) is the first novel in the Game, Set and Match trilogy, introducing Bernard Samson, a world-weary British intelligence officer navigating the treacherous politics of Cold War Berlin. Where Fleming's Bond operates in a world of glamour and certainty, Deighton's Samson inhabits a grittier, morally ambiguous landscape of double agents, bureaucratic betrayal, and divided loyalties. Praised by Julian Symons as the work of "the poet of the spy story", Berlin Game is widely regarded as one of the finest British espionage novels of the twentieth century.