To The Last Page

As entertaining and brilliant as the Slough House series with Jackson Lamb and his crew might be, as changeable as the unfortunate personnel might be when one or another gets knocked off in this dangerous world of spying, Mick Herron's side-related standalone works often enlarge the scope in a thrilling way. The Secret Hours is not billed as a Slough House book then, but that's in name only. It still operates in the same world of spooks, with more of a focus on the Regent's Park, the headquarters of the Secret Service, and there are quite a few familiar faces appearing - often when you least expect. It's also a world that is not so far removed from our own absurd world, in that questionable area where politics and intelligence services collide. Collide is exactly what they all do when a certain PM with liquidity problems and a casual attitude towards the truth, perhaps guided or encouraged by his repugnant special advisor, 'head gnome' Andrew Sparrow, has sugg...

I'm in two minds about the idea of other contemporary writers taking up a classic series of a great author and writing further adventures in their style in their period, in their world. On the one hand there's always some curiosity to see if they can measure up and even surpass the originals, but a fear that they might just get into a pastiche or even Frankenstein compilation of the original author's riffs. I can't testify to the success or otherwise of the continuation of Agatha Christie and Ian Fleming's most famous characters by modern authors, as I've never even read the originals. Nor Stieg Larsson, as I was never a fan of the original . Of those I have tried;  Gyles Brandreth 's spin on Oscar Wilde or Peter Ackroyd's pastiche  The Last Testament of Oscar Wilde  I found well done and entertaining; Stephen Baxter doing HG Wells in  The Massacre of Mankind  not so much as Brian Stapleford's more imaginative  The Hunger and Ecstasy of Vampires . Ch...

Guillaume Musso's Parce que je t'aime (Because I love you) opens with a request not to reveal the ending to your friends. Since you haven't started the book yet, this seems less of a prompt than a warning that you can expect thrills spills and twists along the way. And the book does indeed deliver those dramatic incidents right from the start, with little let up and with a certain amount of contrivance that you would expect and be prepared to accept from a bestseller thriller, from a French writer moreover writing in the same style and setting an American bestseller author… but as long as it delivers on its promise, you will be more than willing to go along with the extraordinary events that take place. First you get a hold up on a Manhattan street where a famous violinist and her companion are threatened by a mugger while out for a walk after her performance at a concert. Nicole Hathaway is very nearly killed in the incident, saved only by a homeless person springing up, ...

Colson Whitehead's latest novel appears to indulge in a nostalgic - or perhaps there should be a case for coining a word like 'anostalgic' - run through the seedy districts and black ghettos of New York in the style of the classic crime of Chester Hines and the blaxploitation movies of the seventies. As you would expect from this Pulitzer Prize-winning author, Crook Manifesto comes however with added authenticity and historical backing. As entertaining as it might be, the first part alone an incredible full pelt crime spree the like of which you haven't seen since those classic movies of the 70s (" a kamikaze run through Harlem "), Whitehead doesn't let you forget that it has a serious and relevant side to the black African-American experience in this three part novel. The opening chapters of Crook Manifesto actually give little indication for what is ahead, but what they do is establish a context for what is to come that is beautifully drawn and immedia...