I’m already a huge Mick Herron fan, having read all the Slow Horses books, but this one…ouf! If indeed “ouf” is an accepted form of praise.
“The Secret Hours” is a brilliant stand-alone novel, but since there are references to Regent’s Park in the book, you gradually realise that is is not exactly stand-alone but more stand-adjacent to the Slow Horses series. The references are very gradual, and I certainly had several lightbulb moments as I recognised a name or a reference. I absolutely did not join certain dots in the book until they were clearly spelled out for me (don’t worry, not going to plot spoil for you!).
Having said this, I want to reiterate that this is absolutely a standalone read. You do not have to have read the Slough House books to enjoy it. But on the other hand, having read them certainly adds to the fun of this book.
The book opens with Max Janacek, a seemingly mild mannered, elderly man being chased by we don’t know who for we don’t know what reason, but what is immediately clear is that Max Janacek is, or has been, in the spy/secret service world, simply by virtue of his escape skills and his instincts.
There is a parallel story of a dull-sounding, uninspiring government mandated enquiry into the workings of the secret service.
There are enough disparaging contemporary references to politicians to make you smile, and make you feel oh-so-clever for identifying them. Ah ha! THAT is Boris Johnson. And THAT is obviously Dominic Cummings.
Mr. Herron’s writing is skilful and he brilliantly captures the grey, rainy reality of wintery London. The routine, the views out of dust windows onto brick walls. The sheer dullness of routine life.
”Through the wet streets, then, though the rain had subsided; through puddles and along cramped pavements; over cracked kerbs and across treacherous stretches of tarmac, when the lights allowed…Daylight had slipped away, to hide in corners until needed, and grey evening was onto the city like a damp cloth over a cage.”
And equally skilfully, Mr. Herron captures the essence of civil service speak:
”…And as far as I’m aware, there’s been no relaxation of the overtime rules.”
As far as I’m aware was one of those verbal decorations the soften a concrete absolute. Anything she wasn’t aware of didn’t happen, so far as the rules went.”
Story lines seem as though they might be very slowly and very gradually converging, but then we move to 1994 Berlin in the aftermath of the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the story swerves to a different set of characters, navigating their way through the new order of things and dealing with their memories.
”When the past meets the present the present always wins, but the victories are fleeting, mere technical knockouts. The present wins every battle, but the past always wins the war.”
The Berlin section reads like a ‘classic” spy thriller, with references to smuggling and abductions, to secret records and new identities, and we cheer as young Alison North tries to negotiate her inexperienced way through this world of hardened, secretive men.
She meets a man known to her as Otis, and observes :
”His face crumpled into what she would come to recognise as his habitually self-mocking expression. It was a carrier bag of a face, she’d decided since. Sometimes it was empty, waiting to be filled; at other times it bulged here and there, never in the same place twice.”
When Alison learns something profoundly shocking, Mr. Herron’s description of her reaction is masterful:
”The same park as earlier; the same big sky, the same squirrels and pigeons doing their things. But there was a big rip down the centre of everything now.”
An absolutely smashing book, that kept me gripped from the very first paragraph. As I admitted earlier on in this review, I was slow to join up some dots. And there was one connection I didn’t fully “get” at all, until I checked out some other reviews of the book. HOW could I have missed it?!
!00% recommended, and as I also said earlier in this review, a great read on its own, but if you’ve read the Slough House books, this one simply adds to the pleasure.
A great read.
And I might just go back and re-read all the Slough House series now.