Books: London Rules (Slough House #5) by Mick Herron

“At MI5 headquarters Regent's Park, First Desk Claude Whelan is learning this the hard way. Tasked with protecting a beleaguered prime minister, he's facing attack from all directions himself: from the showboating MP who orchestrated the Brexit vote, and now has his sights set on Number Ten; from the showboat's wife, a tabloid columnist, who's crucifying Whelan in print; from the PM's favorite Muslim, who's about to be elected mayor of the West Midlands, despite the dark secret he's hiding; and especially from his own deputy, Lady Di Taverner, who's alert for Claude's every stumble. Meanwhile, the country's being rocked by an apparently random string of terror attacks. Over at Slough House, the MI5 satellite office for outcast and demoted spies, the agents are struggling with personal problems: repressed grief, various addictions, retail paralysis, and the nagging suspicion that their newest colleague is a psychopath. Plus someone is trying to kill Roddy Ho. But collectively, they're about to rediscover their greatest strength - that of making a bad situation much, much worse.”

For the most part, this fifth novel in the Slough House (and largely more standalone-ish than the previous four) series plays out like inter-office battle for control more than a terrorist wave hitting London (which, in the end, is really just an excuse for the back-biting). The fact that everyone else hates Ho (who is either clueless or so much a narcissist or, really, just both), that he fell so easily into the trap, is only the icing on the cake for Lamb and his crew.

I sense that while this series of books are sold as modern spy novels that deals in reality and not James Bond fantasy, it’s really about office politics with terrorism thrown in as an almost afterthought. We get a better understanding of that towards the end, where Taverner explains to Catherine what happened to her former boss and why Lamb is head of Slough House and why she was first person he selected. But, in effect, the whole point of London Rules –or the meaning of the title- appears to be CYA (cover your ass). Also try to bury evidence, deny everything and maybe, just maybe, rid yourself of pesky witnesses.

So high stakes office politics. Not really an effective way to run a business, but clearly everyone believes they’re doing the right thing for themselves.

Then there is Herron’s trademark humor, with its off-beat characters, and action (though it tips close to parody and Keystone Cops half-way in) that makes this series work. At times, it seems tongue in cheek, played with a serious underlying tome, but the comedic aspects also there.  

Books: The Fuller Memorandum (Laundry Files #3) by Charles Stross (2010)

“Bob and Mo become tangled up in a plot by some cultists to steal Teapot, also known as the Eater of Souls. The cultists are being manipulated by a bigger, badder, blacker order that wants to bring on CASE NIGHTMARE GREEN (also known as the end of the world) sooner rather than later. If that’s not bad enough, Bob’s boss, Angleton, goes missing, and Bob is suspended from work with pay pending an investigation into a civilian fatality he accidentally caused.”

With what seems like a Robert Ludlum inspired (?) title, The Fuller Memorandum is probably the most accessible of the first three Laundry Files novels - but they’re is still a bunch of somewhat unfriendly tech-speak throughout the book that will go over the heads of us non-computer programming nerds. Like me.

But I would also say this is probably the darkest one so far, as it furthers the arc of Gods, demons, zombies, and other Lovecraftian nightmares that are trying break through the fabric of our reality to destroy the world. The snark remains, however, and there a number of funny bits, like the introduction of the Jesus Phone and The Cult of Steve, along with another jab at British bureaucracy with the spoofiest of James Bond spoofs. But Bob is not your typical suave secret agent; he is a civil servant.

But then are parts –as seen in the previous two books- where Bob goes on for paragraphs at a time about Chthonic beings and Lovecraftian monsters and computational demonology. It’s fun, even cute, but it drags. Stross has created a very clever character, one seemly smarter than everyone else, but it slows the narrative down. But a lot of modern day writers do this, and I’ve always wondered why editors don’t –carefully, I guess- as them to get to the point sooner.

We finally get a bit more background on some characters, most notably Angleton. Last time we learned that Angleton has been with the Laundry since practically its inception—yet hasn’t seemed to age. I like that Stross continues to spin out bits and pieces of Laundry mythology. While each novel is a self-contained, madcap thriller with supernatural elements, the series mythology continues to grow and appearing to head towards some kind of apocalyptic climax.

 

Books: Spook Street (Slough House #4) By Mick Herron (2017)

“A shakeup at MI5 and a terrorist attack on British soil set in motion clandestine machinery known to few modern spies. David Cartwright isn't a modern spy, however; he's legend and a bonafide Cold War hero. He's also in his dotage and losing his mind to Alzheimer's. His stories of -stotes- hiding in the bushes, following his every move have been dismissed by friends and family for years. Cartwright may be losing track of reality but he's certain about one thing: Old spooks don't go quietly and neither do the secrets they keep. So what happens when an old spook loses his mind? Does the Service have a retirement home for those who know too many secrets but don't remember they're secret? Or does someone take care of the senile spy for good? These are the questions River Cartwright must ask when his grandfather, starts to forget to wear pants and begins to suspect everyone in his life has been sent by the Home Office to watch him. River has the other thing worry about, because that bomb has killed forty innocent civilians. The agents of Slough House have to figure out who is behind this act of terror before the situation escalates.”

It’s been noted that Mick Herron often refrains from creating extensive character back stories, and for three books and a novella so far, this has remained true. We know that River Cartwright is the center of the Slough House universe, beyond Jackson Lamb, and a lot of the reasons he remains within Lambs grasp is because his grandfather, David, holds many secrets and also realizes that with his age and Alzheimer’s, is bound to cause problems down the line. In Spook Street, this comes to fruition (because mortality, addiction and ancestral sin are the many themes that play-out through the series). What is learned here points everything into a new direction.

For want of a better description, Spook Street moves fast, and plays out more like a spy thriller than ever. River goes off mostly on his own to solve why someone targeted his grandfather, which means using the passport of assassin that almost succeeded (who strangely looks similar to River). That leads to France and recently burned out building in Les Arbres and where River finds more questions than answers.

Meanwhile, Lamb tries to stall and find out how terror attack and the assassination attempt are connected to the Service. As always, despite him claiming so, Lamb knows things and his instincts are usually correct. This plugs into another theme of Herron’s, that Secret Service operates like any other workplace where "people are often doing quite dull jobs and working with other people who they don’t necessarily like, with a lot of office politics going on.”

Spook House remains true to the previous tales, with his farcical look at bureaucrats of the modern era, with a deeply cynical and often funny and darkly slanted take on politics, spies, peoples foibles, and world at large.

I cannot get enough.

Books: The List (Slough House 2.5) By Mick Herron (2015)

 

“Dieter Hess, an aged spy, is dead, and John Bachelor, his MI5 handler, is in deep, deep trouble. Death has revealed that deceased had been keeping a secret second bank account—and there is only ever one reason a spy has a secret second bank account. The question of whether he was a double agent must be resolved, and its answer may undo an entire career’s worth of spy secrets.”

The List is the first of a handful of short-stories/novellas that are connected to Mick Herron’s main Slough House series, and this one is set between books two and three (I guess book 2.5?). The story introduces a new character, J.K. Coe, who is in his first week with MI5, and who will become a recurring character in the series. The usual team is not too active here (a brief cameo of River Cartwright) but we get scenes –and some funny one-liners- from Jackson Lamb, Catherine Standish and Diane (Lady Di) Taverner.

What’s great here is The List gives the reader a better look at Jackson Lamb, who has spent three novels seemly a couple sets ahead of everyone and shows him why he’s such a badass, which is something he not often does –because he is usually busy with boozing, farting and torturing his Slow Horses. A nice filler, though. 

Still, at the end of the day, these novellas (like the ones Ben Aaronovitch has done with his Rivers of London series), this tale –and other three yet to come- are more for completest than necessary reads.

Books: The Long Walk By Richard Bachman/Stephen King (1979)

“Against the wishes of his mother, sixteen-year-old Ray Garraty is about to compete in the annual grueling match of stamina and wits known as The Long Walk. One hundred boys must keep a steady pace of four miles per hour without ever stopping... with the winner being awarded "The Prize"—anything he wants for the rest of his life. But, as part of this national tournament that sweeps through a dystopian America year after year, there are some harsh rules that Garraty and ninety-nine others must adhere to in order to beat out the rest. There is no finish line—the winner is the last man standing. Contestants cannot receive any outside aid whatsoever. Slow down under the speed limit and you're given a warning. Three warnings and you're out of the game—permanently.”

Stephen King has written and talked at length about the books that make up the initial Richard Bachman titles (Rage, The Long Walk, Roadwork, and The Running Man). While 1984’s Thinner was published as a Bachman title, he was outed by then. Meanwhile, two other Bachman titles, The Regulators {a “mirror” novel to his 1996 King tale Desperation} and Blaze came much later (that 2007 novel started as a novella written in 1973, and was then updated and expanded for the millennium). Finally, at the time of the announcement in 1985 about Bachman, King was already working on Misery, which he had planned to release as a Bachman book.

Hindsight is always 20/20, as it’s clear The Long Walk carried a lot of Stephen King DNA, even if published under Richard Bachman. But it was 1979 and the horror novelist was in his early days so unless you were really a reader who paid attention, what transpires in this book would’ve never been thought of connecting to him. While not highly original (somewhat a cousin to Shirley Jackson’s The Lottery), in many ways this Bachman/King novel is the modern progenitor of the “kids battle to the death game” genre that has taken over YA fiction for these last 20 years or so. Also, really, up until him, up until the 1970s, killing kids in novels was frowned upon. Here, King takes a bunch of youthful characters and puts them through an emotional and physical nightmare where the books simple premise comes into focus: Start walking, don’t stop. If you do, you get a warning. You only get three warnings before, well, as King puts it; you get your ticket punched.

It is a despairing, dark work, or as it’s been called, King’s “most pessimistic novel.” At times, it degenerates into people get killed in gruesome ways and I’m sort of no longer amused by this type of ultra-violence being sold as entertainment. Then there’s James Smythe of The Guardian, who felt the elements of the novel connected to the Vietnam conflict: “the televised draft, the horror of seeing new friends die, the seeming lack of reason for it occurring in the first place.” That theme sort of makes sense, because there is no real for all of this occurring, as Bachman/King does not explain a thing – the reader just assumes this is tale is set in an alternate universe.

With this novel – and another Bachman/King title, The Running Man, due out as films in 2025- I guess I would recommend them. Still, I’m unsure how a film version of this book will work. It’s overlong and much could be cut – but are they going to depict a 100 teen boys being killed?

But I’m not sure I’ll be standing in line at the theater to find out.