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THE CONSTANT GARDENER
A Novel
by JOHN LE CARRE
THE CONSTANT GARDENER
Frightening, heartbreaking, and exquisitely calibrated, John le Carre's new novel opens
with the gruesome murder of the young and beautiful Tessa Quayle near northern
Kenya's Lake Turkana, the birthplace of mankind. Her putative African lover and traveling
companion, a doctor with one of the aid agencies, has vanishedfrom the scene of the
crime. Tessa's much older husband, Justin, a career diplomat at the British High
Commission in Nairobi, sets out on a personal odyssey in pursuit of the killers and their
motive. What he might know and what he ultimately learns make him suspect among his
own colleagues and a target for the profiteers who killed his wife.
A master chronicler of the deceptions and betrayalsof ordinary people caught in
political conflict, le Carre portrays, in The Constant Gardener, the dark side of unbridled
capitalism. His eighteenth novel is also the profoundly moving story of a man whom
tragedy elevates. Justin Quayle, amateur gardener and ineffectual bureaucrat, seemingly
oblivious to his wife's cause, discovers his own resources and the extraordinary courage of
the woman hebarely had time to love.
The Constant Gardener is a magnificent exploration of the new world order by one of
the most compelling and elegant storytellers of our time.
Published by: SCRIBNER. NEW YORK.
Copyright 2001 by David Cornwell
John le Carre was born in 1931. His third novel, The Spy Who Came in from the Cold,
secured him a worldwide reputation, which was consolidated by the acclaimfor his trilogy
Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy; The Honorable Schoolboy; and Smiley's People. His novels
include The Little Drummer Girl, A Perfect Spy, The Russia House, Our Game, The Tailor
of Panama, and Single and Single. John le Carre lives in Cornwall.
PRAISE FOR JOHN LE CARRE
"Le Carre is more than just a great storyteller. He captures the zeitgeist itself."--TOM
WOLFE
"He is one of thehalf-dozen best novelists now working in English." --CHICAGO SUNTIMES
"A brilliant linguistic artist with a keen eye for the exotic and not-so-exotic locale, a
crafty moralizer with an occasional bent for sentiment." --THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
"No other contemporary novelist has more durably enjoyed the twin badges of being
both well read and well regarded."--SCOTT TUROW
"Le Carre has a greattalent for entangling his audience in the sticky tape of
complexity, paradox, and irony, and much of the pleasure in his stories is following the
same dense, dark path as his characters."--NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

"Any reader who feared that the end of the Cold War would deprive Mr. le Carre of his
subject can now feel a measure of relief. If anything, his subject of East-West
misunderstandinghas grown richer, and he now possesses vast new territories to mine."-THE NEW YORK TIMES
"He has reinvented the realistic spy story as the supreme theater of paradox, where
heroism breeds vice, and virtue is a quite accidental by-product of impudent crimes."-TIME
"Le Carre is one of the best novelists--of any kind--we have."--VANITY FAIR
ALSO BY JOHN LE CARRE
CALL FOR THE DEAD
A MURDER OFQUALITY
THE SPY WHO CAME IN FROM THE COLD
THE LOOKING GLASS WAR
A SMALL TOWN IN GERMANY
THE NAIVE AND SENTIMENTAL LOVER
TINKER TAILOR SOLDIER SPY
THE HONORABLE SCHOOLBOY
SMILEY'S PEOPLE
THE LITTLE DRUMMER GIRL
A PERFECT SPY
THE RUSSIA HOUSE
THE SECRET PILGRIM
THE NIGHT MANAGER
OUR GAME
THE TAILOR OF PANAMA
SINGLE AND SINGLE
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places,and incidents either are products
of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or
locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
For Yvette Pierpaoli who lived and died giving a damn
Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp, Or what's a heaven for? "Andrea del
Sarto" by ROBERT BROWNING

THE CONSTANT GARDENER
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