Leonard Cyril Deighton (b: 18 February 1929) is a British author, best known for his spy novels.
His first novel was “The Ipcress File”, published in 1962. The book was a best-seller in the UK, France and the US; the novel sold more than 2.5 million copies in three years.
A subsequent screenplay for a film called “The Ipcress File” was developed in 1965, starring British actor, Michael Caine as the central character, ‘Harry Palmer’.
A TV series was also adapted from the book in 2022.
Deighton wrote a number of other fiction and non-fiction books.
He published two fictional novels retaining the character, ‘Harry Palmer’, namely: “Horse Under Water” (1963) and “Funeral in Berlin” (1964).
Deighton also published the following fictional books:
- “Billion-Dollar Brain” (1966);
- “An Expensive Place to Die” (1967);
- “Only When I Laugh” (1967)
- “Bomber” (1971)
- “Close-Up” (1972)
- “Spy Story” (1974)
- “Yesterday’s Spy” (1975)
- “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Spy / Catch a Falling Spy” (1976)
- “SS-GB” (1978)
- “XPD” (1981)
- “Goodbye, Mickey Mouse” (1982)
- “MAMista” (1991)
- “City of Gold” (1992)
- “Violent Ward” (1993)
Deighton wrote three connected trilogies:
- Berlin Game (1983), Mexico Set (1984) and London Match (1985);
- Spy Hook (1988), Spy Line (1989) and Spy Sinker (1990); and
- Faith (1994), Hope (1995) and Charity (1996); and
Winter (a Berlin Family), a companion novel (written in 1987).
The trilogies are centred on the character “Bernard Samson”, an MI6 intelligence officer.
