Customer Reviews

Funeral in Berlin

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This was the second Len Deighton I read and words escape me as to how I felt about it. The suspense started on the first page and carried through the entire book, with virtually no lapses in the storyline. The characters were extremely interesting and well developed...I could almost picture them as real people in post-war Berlin. I rank this book alongside "The Spy Who Came in From the Cold" and the Smiley trilogy, both by John LeCarre. I highly recommend this book to anyone that enjoys a good read.

An oldie but goldie in the cold war spy double double-crossing genre. This has an original 1964 publication date. It came after Spy Story. Some characters recurr in The Ipcress File where the proragonist (nameless in this) is called Palmer. The Spy Who Came in From the Cold had already been written (and we'd had Graham Greene).
I remembered it for the ingenious plotting. Re-reading it I'm struck by the quality of the prose. Later Len Deightons don't contain such fancy writing. He loves describing the shabby and dingy:
"I looked around at Grenade's office: the brown-stained wainscotting, the plaster walls discolored in patches near the ceiling and the old-fashioned metal radiators under which a rash of cream-colored pimples proclaimed the haste of a clumsy painter."

This was Deighton's second book, before he became vaguely hackish and joined the Ludlum/Forsythe "hefty Cold War thriller" gang. Here he has style to burn, definitely influenced by Chandler but not at all a pastiche or pale imitation. His sentences are crisp and always un-cliched; his attitude, as filtered through his nameless British protagonist, is cynical and put-upon and tough as a blackjack. You're more than welcome to picture Michael Caine embodying the anti-hero, as he did in the effective (though a bit uneven) film.

on the second reading I found it quite annoying that Deighton is constantly playing some strange game:

1. Colonel Stok is at least 65 years old (the action takes place in 1963 and he participated in the Russian revolution in 1917 as an adult). It is a big stretch to believe that there are some colonels that are that old but it is impossible to believe that he will wear a corporal uniform to hide his position or that he was a captain in 1945. His name is intentionally mangled and his last name is anything but Russian.

2. Jewish girl is thinking about how special is it to visit her mother on Christmas.

3. French are eager to execute a Communist FTP member for war-time assassination of a collaborator. The whole thing seems quite ridiculous in addition to that in 1963 Commies were one of the biggest political parties in France and would be able to protect some of their own on this matter.

4. The whole 15 years long extremely dangerous affair was going to net just a few millions?????

Okay, I'm a huge fan of Deighton's. I'm predisposed to enjoy his intelligent mix of spy procedural plotting, the occasional apt aphorism and his descriptive metaphors setting the scene of each new location into which his man walks. But this was quite good in plot, definitely better than An Expensive Place to Die, the plot of which I never quite bought.

It was curious to read this back after having first seen the movie. The makers of the three Harry Palmer films changed the plots significantly from those of all three books, so, if, like me, you thought the film of Funeral in Berlin was somewhat lackluster, don't be afraid to pick up the book. I'd say the same of Billion Dollar Brain. Only in The Ipcress File did they vary the plot from that of the book and tell as interesting a story in a different way.

I will read anything by Len Deighton and did so this past summer.7 books in all.
This was one of the best and I am still thinking about it months later.
His sense of style and turn of phrase includeds all the elements that make a fine writer.

This is another entry in the Cinema Hall of Shame category. The book has an excellent plot. The film version of the novel is good for about sixty minutes and the last sixty minutes are awful.
In the novel, the British spy (Harry Palmer in the film) goes to Berlin to facilitate the defection of a Soviet scientist, The plot is a great deal more complicated, of course, and has plenty of twists and turns but is satisfying. It also contains one of the most unusual and stunning twists in fiction, which concerns the background of Vulcan in the novel.
That twist is missing in the movie. Vulcan becomes another former Nazi. The second half of Deighton's novel is changed in the film and becomes an atrocity. The producers and writer of the movie should be banished from filmmaking forever,
One problem in the novel is Deighton would never be accused of being a prose stylist. Getting through his writing, at times, is akin to hacking your way through a rain forest with a machete. In later books, though, he improved.

excellent book. The author does an excellent job using the cold war mostly in Berlin as a backdrop.
The Bernard Samson series (nine books) are also excellent.

No one masters relevant details like Len Deighton. The characters are developed and the plot a mystery -- an excellent combination. The only flaw I see is the odd time or two when I had difficulty following the developments. I am and have been a fan for years and am pleased so much of his work is available for the Kindle.