Slough House
On sale
2nd September 2021
Price: £8.99
Genre
*Soon to be a major TV series starring Gary Oldman*
*THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER*
**THE TIMES THRILLER BOOK OF THE YEAR**
‘A gripping thriller’ Ian Rankin
Slough House – the crumbling office building to which failed spies, the ‘slow horses’, are banished – has been wiped from secret service records.
Reeling from recent losses in their ranks, the slow horses are worried they’ve been pushed further into the cold, and fatal accidents keep happening.
With a new populist movement taking a grip on London’s streets, the aftermath of a blunder by the Russian secret service that left a British citizen dead, and the old order ensuring that everything’s for sale to the highest bidder, the world’s an uncomfortable place for those deemed surplus to requirements. The wise move would be to find a safe place and wait for the troubles to pass.
But the slow horses aren’t famed for making wise decisions.
‘The most completely realised espionage universe since that peopled by George Smiley’ The Times
‘An absolute tour-de-force’ Sunday Express
*THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER*
**THE TIMES THRILLER BOOK OF THE YEAR**
‘A gripping thriller’ Ian Rankin
Slough House – the crumbling office building to which failed spies, the ‘slow horses’, are banished – has been wiped from secret service records.
Reeling from recent losses in their ranks, the slow horses are worried they’ve been pushed further into the cold, and fatal accidents keep happening.
With a new populist movement taking a grip on London’s streets, the aftermath of a blunder by the Russian secret service that left a British citizen dead, and the old order ensuring that everything’s for sale to the highest bidder, the world’s an uncomfortable place for those deemed surplus to requirements. The wise move would be to find a safe place and wait for the troubles to pass.
But the slow horses aren’t famed for making wise decisions.
‘The most completely realised espionage universe since that peopled by George Smiley’ The Times
‘An absolute tour-de-force’ Sunday Express
Newsletter Signup
By clicking ‘Sign Up,’ I acknowledge that I have read and agree to Hachette Book Group’s Privacy Policy and Terms of Use
Reviews
I can report that the new Mick Herron novel, Slough House, is as eye-wateringly funny as it is nerve-shreddingly tense. I think this might be the best Jackson Lamb outing yet, and that's taking it above a very high benchmark
This is a darker, scarier Herron. The gags are still there but the satire's more biting. The privatization of a secret service op and the manipulation of news is relevant and horribly credible
Mick Herron is one of the finest writers of his generation
I enjoyed Slough House tremendously. Witty, clever and horribly on point. Lots to laugh about while being careful not to miss a word. This isn't a book to skim read
An excellent writer
[Slough House] is the best yet. The jokes are frequent and good, the pacing first rate, and the plot pieces, the moves and countermoves, snap as satisfyingly into place as anything I've read in the genre.
Herron has certainly devised the most completely realised espionage universe since that peopled by George Smiley...What Herron has actually been writing is a modern sit-com. This is "the Office" (as insiders refer to MI6) as The Office, half-complete with the Slough setting.
[Jackson Lamb] Herron's glorious creation propels the story to the bitter end where the non-stop barrage of jokes is fatally undercut by a final shocking twist.
I'll tell you what, to have been lucky enough to play Smiley in one's career; and now go and play Jackson Lamb in Mick Herron's novels - the heir, in a way, to le Carre - is a terrific thing.
