Rating: 5/5
Review:
An excellent read
I thought East Of Hounslow was excellent. I half expected it to be yet another generic,
slightly formulaic thriller, but it turned out to be gripping, witty and to
make some very shrewd observations.
The set-up is good: Javid ("Jay") Qasim is a
small-time drug dealer living with his mum in West London. Through a series of entertaining and
sometimes very exciting events, he is recruited by MI5 and also into a jihadi
group on whom he is to spy. This sounds
like a pretty conventional basis for a spy novel, but it's very well done,
taking unexpected turns while always remaining plausible – in fact, a lot of
the unexpected turns are precisely because they're plausible rather than
following the conventions of thrillers.
Two things make this stand out, I think: Jay's narrative
voice and the thoughtful balance of the observations about the politics behind
jihad and counterterrorism. Jay's
street-smart, often out-of-his-depth take on things was excellent and gave the
book genuine wit in places and a terrific narrative drive so I found it
genuinely hard to put down. His
predicament and other scenes in the book carry some very thoughtful reflections
on behaviour on both sides of the War On Terror, and on things like the way
both use the hateful actions of an extreme few on the other side to justify
their own hateful actions. Seeing it
from the point of view of an ordinary young British muslim man gives a
fascinating perspective which, because of Jay's character and style, never
becomes preachy or heavy.
In short, this is an excellent espionage thriller with
important things to say. It is well
written, very gripping and very readable.
Warmly recommended.
(I received an ARC via NetGalley.)
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