John le Carré, known for spy thrillers such as The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, turned 79 this Tuesday. According to MobyLives:

He’s since gone on to write some of the finest thrillers in the literature. And now, in his eightieth year, he’s still going strong. His new book, Our Kind of Traitor, is receiving rave reviews. In a review in The New York Times, Michiko Kakutani called it, a bullet-train of a thriller, saying it’s the author’s most thrilling thriller in years.