A matter of time
(Baskerville, £18.99)
Brexit policy adviser Dr Sophie de Greer has vanished, sounding alarm bells at 10 Downing Street. Former head of MI5 Claude Whelan is given the task of tracking her down by Anthony Sparrow, her boss and the Prime Minister’s special adviser.
A Downing Street svengali suggests rogue forces in Britain’s security services have used a defunct programme to effectively rendition Dr de Greer.
Although Claude is suspicious of his informant’s motives, he is happy to be brought out of semi-retirement. And if his investigation serves only to infuriate Diana Taverner, his replacement as MI5 First Desk, he feels it will have been time well spent as payback for her role in ousting him.
Nonetheless, he is surprised when the trail leads back to MI5 HQ Regent’s Park – with Taverner as the chief suspect.
At the same time, everyone at Regent’s Park is focused on tracing the movements of Vassily Rasanokov, Taverner’s Russian counterpart, who has surfaced in London after slipping into the country undetected and spending a few days under MI5’s radar.
But the service’s failed spooks, sidelined at Slough House under the control of heavy-drinking spymaster Jackson Lamb, are also taking an interest in Dr de Greer’s disappearance and the unexpected arrival of Rasanokov. So an unstable situation is about to become even more chaotic.
The eighth instalment of the Jackson Lamb series uses Mick Herron’s trademark sardonic wit and black humour to take a caustic look at the powerbrokers of modern Britain.
It’s beautifully written with a satisfyingly complex plot and an explosive finale.
Herron remains Britain’s finest living thriller writer. With Gary Oldman currently portraying Jackson Lamb in a TV adaptation of the first book in the series, Slow Horses, on Apple+, a wider audience is now able to appreciate his remarkable talent.
These explosive new thrillers will keep you gripped until the very last page
Wrong Place Wrong Time by Gillian McAllister (Michael Joseph, £12.99)
It’s the night before Halloween and Jen is carving a pumpkin while she waits for her 18-year-old son Todd to come home after a night out. She spots him as he walks towards their house – then watches in horror as he gets into an argument with an older man, pulls out a knife and fatally stabs him.
When the police arrive, Todd tells the officers he killed the man, despite his solicitor mother urging him to say nothing. He is taken into custody where he refuses legal representation.
Jen vows to find her son a good lawyer in the morning and falls asleep on the sofa in despair. But then she wakes to find it is yesterday. The murder has not yet taken place.
Every morning after that, Jen wakes up a day earlier, gradually travelling further back in time.
At first, she thinks she is losing her mind, then realises she has a chance to stop her teenage son from becoming a killer – if only she can find out what motivated him to commit the murder in the first place.
Wrong Place Wrong Time is a masterfully plotted and ingenious psychological thriller told in reverse.
Gripping and full of surprises, it’s one of the best books I’ve read this year.