Thursday, 24 March 2016

Mick Herron - Real Tigers


Rating: 5/5

Review:
A great read



I thought Real Tigers was excellent.  It is the third in Mick Herron's Slough House series.  It's the first I've read, and it works as a stand alone novel, but there is history and spoilers for the first two books, so it might be best to read them first.  Nevertheless, this was hugely enjoyable: exciting, funny and very gripping, making it one of the best spy novels I've read for quite a while.

The plot is complex with plenty of surprises so I won't give any spoilers, but it's extremely well done and very gripping.  What makes this special, though, is its characters and its dialogue.  Slough House is where MI5 sends its agents who have messed up in some way, and they're an engaging bunch of misfits, presided over by the magnificently appalling Lamb who is a terrific creation.  This group, plus a fine cast of other characters provide a superb, seedy, treacherous setting.   Using this, Herron strikes an excellent balance between comedy and real thriller so that I laughed out loud several times, and also became very gripped by the whole thing.

I have already got the first two books in the series lined up and am looking forward to them enormously.  This is a really great read, and I hope the series has a long, glorious future ahead of it.  Very warmly recommended.

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