MI5 and Me: 'Imagine a Jilly Cooper heroine in an early John le Carré world'
Mar 2018 · Bloomsbury Publishing
5.0star
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Ebook
256
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About this ebook
'A Jilly Cooper heroine in a John le Carré world' (Libby Purves, TLS); a beguiling comic memoir about a young woman who discovers her father is a spy (and was the model for John le Carré's George Smiley) and goes to work as a secretary in 1950s MI5
Much to her surprise, eighteen-year-old Lottie has just found out that her aloof, rather unexciting father is a spy. And now he's decreed that she must make herself useful and get a Proper Job – so she's packed off to MI5 herself, trussed up in a dreary suit. Luckily her delightful colleague Arabella is on hand to enliven the torments of typing and decode the enigmas of office life. But as Lottie's home fills with actors doubling as spies, and Arabella's mother is besieged with mysterious telephone calls, the girls start to feel well and truly spooked...
A hilarious true story, and a unique window into 1950s Britain – where Russian agents infiltrate the highest echelons, where debutantes are typists and where Englishness is both a nationality and a code of behaviour – MI5 and Me is a sparkling comic memoir.
Much to her surprise, eighteen-year-old Lottie has just found out that her aloof, rather unexciting father is a spy. And now he's decreed that she must make herself useful and get a Proper Job – so she's packed off to MI5 herself, trussed up in a dreary suit. Luckily her delightful colleague Arabella is on hand to enliven the torments of typing and decode the enigmas of office life. But as Lottie's home fills with actors doubling as spies, and Arabella's mother is besieged with mysterious telephone calls, the girls start to feel well and truly spooked...
A hilarious true story, and a unique window into 1950s Britain – where Russian agents infiltrate the highest echelons, where debutantes are typists and where Englishness is both a nationality and a code of behaviour – MI5 and Me is a sparkling comic memoir.
Ratings and reviews
5.0
1 review
Tim Fletcher
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July 21, 2025
good story and prose
About the author
Charlotte Bingham wrote her first book, Coronet Among the Weeds, a memoir of her life as a debutante, at the age of 19. It was published in 1963 and became an instant bestseller. She went on the write a further memoir, Coronet Among the Grass. Her father, John Bingham, the 7th Baron Clanmorris, was a member of M15 where Charlotte Bingham worked as a secretary. He was an inspiration for John le Carré's character George Smiley.
Charlotte Bingham went on to write thirty-three internationally bestselling novels and, in partnership with her late husband Terence Brady, a number of successful, plays, films and TV series including Upstairs Downstairs and Take Three Girls. She lives in Somerset.
charlottebingham.com
Charlotte Bingham went on to write thirty-three internationally bestselling novels and, in partnership with her late husband Terence Brady, a number of successful, plays, films and TV series including Upstairs Downstairs and Take Three Girls. She lives in Somerset.
charlottebingham.com
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