Slow Horses
by Mick Herron
Buy on AmazonSlough House is Jackson Lamb's kingdom; a dumping ground for members of the intelligence service who've screwed up: left a secret file on a train, blown a surveillance, or become drunkenly unreliable. They're the service's poor relations - the slow horses - and bitterest among them is River Cartwright, whose days are spent transcribing mobile phone conversations. But when a young man is abducted, and it's threatened that he'll be beheaded live on the Internet, River sees an opportunity to redeem himself. Is the victim who he first appears to be? And what's the kidnappers' connection with a disgraced journalist? As the clock ticks on the execution, River finds that everyone involved has their own agenda ...
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"In culture, if you do something new, something original, something that hasn’t been seen before, you will be rewarded. Mick’s books are hugely popular, not just here, but everywhere and I think the principal reason for that is that he’s done something new, which is almost to send up the world of John le Carré, to satirize it. His world is located somewhere between the Circus and The Office . The books are very funny, they celebrate failure, heroism against the odds, and have an old-fashioned bawdy, music hall humor. It’s a very clever reimagining of a world that was extremely familiar to readers, from The Spy Who Came in from the Cold onwards. Yes, they’re clever, intricate plots. The books are addictive and funny but shot through with political seriousness."
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