Any fears I had been having that I might have had my fill of Slough House soon disappeared with the first chapter of Bad Actors. River Cartwright is missing in action but the remaining dogs are perfectly capable of grabbing the reader’s attention and running with it.
Diana Taverner’s position as First Desk is under threat from a nasty little man by the name of Anthony Sparrow, and the plot evolves from that point. There is a sweet new character, John Bachelor, “the milkman”; however, there is still nothing sweet about our old friend, the disgusting Jackson Lamb, grottier than ever and being as horrible as only he knows how while seeing and knowing all and, in a strange way, taking care of his underlings. They might be losers but they’re his losers.
Mick Herron is a brilliant writer and I can’t resist at least one quote: “Early sixties by a mortal calendar, but managing to exude the impression that he’d overseen the Siege of Mafeking”. Bad Actors is equally as clever, witty and exciting as its seven predecessors.
Mick Herron is the master of spy fiction for our times!
Baskerville: an imprint of John Murray
Although Bad Actors meanders a bit, it is still almost as compelling a read as Slow Horses. Mind you, that’s not surprising: on Amazon, Mick Herron is described as “The John Le Carré of our generation” and it’s all to do with bad actors and slow horses. Who would have thought le Carré might be associated with "any generation"! In terms of acclaimed spy novels, Herron’s Slough House series has definitely made him Top Of The Pops in terms of anti-Bond writers. For Len Deighton devotees that ends a long and victorious reign at number one.
ReplyDeleteRaw noir espionage of the Slough House quality is rare, whether or not with occasional splashes of sardonic hilarity. Gary Oldman’s performance in Slow Horses has given the Slough House series the leg up the charts it deserved. Will Jackson Lamb become the next Bond? It would be a rich paradox if he became an established anti-Bond brand ambassador. Maybe Lamb should change his name to Happy Jack or Pinball Wizard or even Harry Jack. After all, Harry worked for Palmer as might Edward Burlington for Bill Fairclough in another noir but factual spy series, The Burlington Files.
Of course, espionage aficionados should know that both The Slough House and Burlington Files series were rejected by risk averse publishers who didn't think espionage existed unless it was fictional and created by Ian Fleming or David Cornwell. However, they probably didn’t know that Fairclough once drummed with Keith Moon in their generation in the seventies.