Raymond Hawkey time at the Royal College of Art Hawkey first encountered Len Deighton when Deighton (another RCA scholarship student at that time) gatecrashed a literary party that Hawkey was helping to organise. Instead of ejecting the intruder, Hawkey found much in common with him and they became "lifelong friends" (Dempsey, "ibid"). In 1962, Hawkey was Deighton's choice to design the cover of his first novel "The IPCRESS File", which some regard as the template for the covers of all subsequent airport novels. He went on to design covers for Deighton's books, including "Horse Under Water", "Funeral in Berlin" and "The Action
The IPCRESS File program in Canada. Deighton's protagonist is nameless; this is maintained through all the sequels (although later in the series called "Charles"). Early in the novel we learn that he worked for Military Intelligence for three years before joining his present agency – WOOC(P) – as a civilian employee. WOOC(P) is described as "one of the smallest and most important of the Intelligence Units". (It is never stated exactly what the initials stand for, although his previous boss refers to it as Provisional.) We also learn in passing that he is from Burnley, Lancashire, and that he was born in 1922