One of the things I like about John le Carre was that he wrote what he knew. He was in internal security, so he wrote about that in his first book. He taught at

One of the things I like about John le Carre was that he wrote what he knew. He was in internal security, so he wrote about that in his first book. He taught at Eton and his second book is set at a fictional Eton-like public school. Later he was in foreign intelligence and he wrote books from that perspective. His intelligence career came to an end in similar circumstances as his third book. While not a diplomat (The Constant Gardener) I imagine he did run in those circles during his government career.