The Looking Glass War is a 1965 spy novel by John le Carré. Written in response to the positive public reaction to his previous novel, The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, the book explores the unglamorous nature of espionage and the danger of nostalgia. The book tells the story of an incompetent British intelligence agency known as The Department and its multiple botched attempts to verify a Communist defector's story of a Soviet missile buildup in East Germany. Some editions hyphenate "Looking Glass".
None of the coolness or suaveness of the other Smiley books, dripping with borderline hatred. Some of Le Carré’s best writing appears between scenes as he weaves a tapestry of hubris, ineptitude and utter failure.
