Spies, moles and murky murder
MY NAME IS NOBODY by Matthew Richardson (Michael Joseph £12.99)
THIS spy story from a 26-yearold Westminster speech writer who went to Oxford is a supremely confident debut.
It introduces Solomon Vine, once the brightest of his generation of spies, but whose star has dimmed in the wake of the shooting of a prisoner on his watch.
Suspended and in exile, he nevertheless is induced by his old mentor in MI6 to look into the abduction of the Service’s head of station in Istanbul, where there were signs of a violent struggle.
Vine begins his unofficial search, only for his mentor to end up dead — possibly of a heart attack, possibly not — but not before he has left his protege a suggestion that there is a mole at the Service’s heart, codenamed Nobody.
This story is told with panache and a taste for the intricacies of spycraft that mark it as outstanding.
Vine reminds me not so much of le Carre’s Smiley, but rather Len Deighton’s spy in his marvellous debut The Ipcress File in 1962. If he keeps going, Vine could be that good.
THE CHILD by Fiona Barton (Bantam £12.99)
A FOLLOW-UP to former Daily Mail journalist Barton’s bestselling debut The Widow, which I welcomed last year, this new thriller underlines her exceptional ability to sustain a striking story from first page to last.
The premise is disarmingly simple: the remains of a baby are found during building work in Woolwich, East London. The news is reported in the evening paper, but it sends shivers down the spine of one woman, Emma, who appears to have a secret to hide, and another, Angela, who believes it might be her daughter.
Meanwhile a third, the journalist Kate who was involved in Barton’s first novel, is looking for a story. She sets the cat among the pigeons by investigating what lies behind the tiny skeleton, going to the site and trying to find out who the baby was and which mother may have lost a child.
So begins a journey to uncover the truth. I have reservations about journalists as protagonists — they are observers rather than instigators — but I was swayed by a twisty and satisfying plot.
THE PINOCCHIO BRIEF by Abi Silver (Lightning £8.99)
A REFRESHING debut from a former lawyer that starts with an uncommunicative 15-yearold being charged with the murder of his maths master at his prestigious London boarding school.
The boy’s mother appeals to a determined young lawyer, Constance Lamb, who once helped one of his contemporaries get off a shoplifting charge. This is quite a different matter, however, and so Constance seeks the help of experienced defence barrister Judith Burton. She agrees to take the case, but does not reveal that she has secrets of her own.
Neither woman is convinced that their client is helping them as much as he could — he was found beside the body with the master’s blood on his hands — even though he insists he is innocent.
But they also believe that the police have taken the easy option of charging the obvious suspect.
Add in the possibility that a new lie-detecting device, called Pinocchio, will be used at the trial and you have all the ingredients of a first-rate courtroom drama, which this is.