Twenty years retired, David Cartwright can still spot when the stoats are on his trail.
Jackson Lamb worked with Cartwright years ago. He knows better than most that this is no vulnerable old man. 'Nasty old spook with blood on his hands' would be a more accurate description.
'The old bastard' has raised his grandson with a head full of guts and glory. But far from joining the myths and legends of Spook Street, River Cartwright is consigned to Lamb's team of pen-pushing no-hopers at Slough House.
Another slow start but the pace did pick up. I enjoyed the dialogue & have come to like Lamb. The other characters were well portrayed.

My honest review is for a special copy I voluntarily read

The second book to follow Slow Horses this time they are seconded into some seemingly low profile operation.. Meanwhile a bait has been laid to cause them to follow. Nothing is what it seems and it's all smoke and mirrors. and the mess that ensues with the casualties that results and how they escape from this mayhem makes an exciting and riveting read.

Whose turn is it this time? You can always be sure that one of Jackson Lamb's team of bottom of the rung intelligence agents is going to get put through the wringer, tortured and beaten up pretty badly, or worse, take a bullet. As it happens, one of the regular 'slow horses' in the Slough House team gets whacked in Spook Street, permanently. Sorry for being blunt about it, but well, it goes with the territory, and there will always be plenty of other candidates to take their place in the secret service's dumping ground. Slough House is where the intelligence services demote those agents who need to be quietly 'let go', some of them having done time in the field and messed up really badly, others who will never be let anywhere near it. Since they can't be trusted to go back into normal society either, exile to Slough House means spending the rest of their days wading through reams of data to ensure that they never forget just how worthless they are. There's no place for sparing anyone's feelings here.

So when a slow horse is kidnapped, interrogated by the Dogs in the HQ at Regent's Park, dies in action or in mysterious circumstances that it's best not to make known to the general public (these things happen surprisingly frequently to a bunch of data miners), well, as I said, it goes with the territory and there's no point in taking it personally. In the last Slough House book (which seem to be recategorised now as the Jackson Lamb series), Real Tigers, it was Catherine Standish who ended up 'tested', caught up in a peculiar exercise as part of an internal power struggle that inevitably ended up going badly wrong (and how!), but it was River Cartwright who took the brunt of the fall-out. To be honest though, hardly any of the team (Jackson Lamb apart) came out of it unscathed. The experience did kind of serve to strengthen the team bond (Roderick Ho excepted obviously), even if all that really did was underline just how in-it-all-together at the bottom of the barrel the slow horses are.

Any yet, it still comes as a shock when one of Jackson Lambs' unhappy little group of misfits meets with a very sudden and nasty end - but obviously I'm not going to reveal here who that is.

The fact that it's a harsh and even callous world we are operating in here is exemplified by Roderick Ho, whose first response to the news of a dead colleague is to get in and cannibalise the computer of the recently deceased for parts to supercharge his own PC. So no, it's not Roderick Ho who takes a bullet - more's the pity some might say - but you didn't think Mick Herron was going to take the easy option on this one, did you? Far from taking the easy option in fact - we're dealing with pretty slippery characters and situations here - Mick Herron takes the more convoluted approach, so beware that nothing is as it seems and there are considerably more twists and turns that occur before we get to the end of Spook Street. There might be a new suit running the shop after the last debacle, but Lady Di Taverner is still up to her old tricks, so the potential for a messy situation of enormous proportions is more than likely.

Mick Herron's writing is viciously entertaining. In Spook Street he's as sharp as ever in the endlessly inventive witty exchanges of dialogue and put-downs - it really is laugh out loud funny - but he's also bang up to date in his observations of the nature of the 'post truth' world we live in. It might once have been the preserve of politicians and the intelligence services, but we are all living in this world now. And that can be a very dark place as we recognise even more so in Herron's latest spy thriller. Underneath the jet black humour and the blunt reactions (or lack of reactions) to what is going on, there's an air of sadness here, of bitterness and fear, of feeling powerless against greater forces beyond our control. Herron doesn't just manage to soak up the desperation of a team who are at the very bottom of the secret service heap, in them he encapsulates where we all stand in the greater scheme of things. Herron is the Chekhov of the Twitter age, the Tolstoy of a surveillance society, where focus groups and anger management courses and posted YouTube videos are the only weapons we have to empower us in our fight against very real fears and existential crises.

Well, obviously not the only weapons, else one of the Slough House crew wouldn't be getting whacked with a bullet in the head, but essentially Herron shows that human nature hasn't changed all that much, even if fear and terror comes to our door in different ways, and even if the politicians and their dogs operate in new media-savvy ways. A few familiar figures have slipped to the sidelines in Spook Street and there are a few new faces to the ranks, but the operations in power-grabbing, self-preservation, ass-covering and blame-gaming are very much in evidence. And yes, we are dealing with the now always topical subject of a terror attack in a major European city; London obviously being the city in question, the victim of a suicide bomber in the large Westacres shopping mall. If you think that's going to send the city into panic, it's nothing compared to the upheavals it causes in Spook Street, particularly when the facts of the attack and their roots to a secretive operation in France, start to come to light.

So there's not much more to be said about Spook Street. You know the old saying about what I'll have to do if I tell you? Well in this case, I don't think my life would be worth living if I gave away anything more about the plot. All that needs to be said is that Spook Street is classic Mick Herron. There's never a dull moment, and it's witty, dark, sinister and vaguely troubling. And one of the crew gets whacked. But maybe not in the way you think. Nothing is certain in this world. Best laid plans and all that. The only thing certain is that Jackson Lamb is his usual disagreeable self - to put it mildly, which he never does - rude, blunt and never lost for a one-liner put-down or a flatulent expression of his disdain. Based on where we've come so far, and the fact that Herron is on top of his game and always capable of coming up with inventive and credible twists that genuinely surprise, the only other certainty is that this latest Jackson Lamb thriller was always likely to be getting a five-star rating.

A massive terror attack on a London shopping mall may have shocked the capital, but Jackson Lamb is more concerned with goading his team of deadbeat spooks, the so -called slow horses. But when one of them appears to have been killed by his own grandfather, a former high-ranking MI5 agent, the trail of terror leads back to Jackson and his team. Ever twisting, fast-paced and shot through with the series’ typical gallows humour, Spook Street is the best in the series so far.

Fantastic, breathtaking, audacious and exhausting – but read the series in order for maximum enjoyment

Introducing Slough House and the Slow Horses for those coming to the series via Book 4 though I strongly suggest, starting with book 1, and getting to this one in sequence:

The series follows a group of Z lister sppoks, and also the high fliers of the A listers of MI5, who run policy and do the high octane stuff. Slough House is where former MI5 personnel, who have fouled up in some way either through character defects or evidence of some kind of incompetence, are put out to paid grass. Someone has to do the boring stuff of videocam checks, and trawl through vehicle licence plates and phone records, and getting the disgraced ‘Slow Horses’ to do this, stops redundancy pay outs and legal cases. Chances are, the Slow Horse will resign due to extreme tedium, hence, no payout, and there will always be others to demote to Horsedom. To a man and woman, the Slow Horses regret their prior high flying status, and hope against hope that some kind of saving the world and defence of the realm activity will come their way, and they might, therefore return to the fold of MI5. In their own way, each of this fascinating group of misfits is more than capable

They are led by a monstrous, Rabelasian (at least in turns of various odoriferous bodily emissions and capacity to indulge alcohol, junk food and tobacco) man, Jackson Lamb. Lamb is the least lamb like creature imaginable. Irascible, bullying, grubby, obnoxious and lethal, sharp as a whole army of lasers and with, despite his lack of obvious appeal, a great loyalty to the band of ‘joes’ he rules and insults. Despite the drudgery of desk work, the Slow Horses are still involved in dangerous activities. Over the course of the books some have died, new characters have come to take their places, and some, there from the start, are still with us, though the danger of their work makes the reader wonder from whence the heartache of losing a strange old friend from an earlier book, will come

Herron brings different Horses into the leaders of each book’s race, and some characters met much earlier might be very very slow horses, waiting their turn to gallop to the death or marginal glory finish.

Central to this book is the aging David Cartwright. Almost ‘First Desk’ during the Cold War, he is now living in quiet retirement in the country, beginning to slide into dementia. An elderly spook, becoming loose lipped and garrulous might have dangerous secrets to unwittingly spill. And there might be several interested in plugging such a leak before it happens.

I must confess to some small disappointment with the previous book in the series, Real Tigers, though not disappointed enough to not want to proceed on to the next.

Very happily, Spook Street has gone stratospheric in my estimation. So stratospheric that I had to stop reading at times because Herron had taken me to a place where I hardly dared to advance, because of fear and grief of what might be to come. A writer does something particularly brilliant when they take a reader to a place of ‘in denial’ – I don’t think I can bear to know more, I can’t bear to not know. Suspense, anxiety, on the edge.

All through the series, from the very first page of Slow Horses, Herron has thrown justified shocks, surprises, feints, and reverses at his readers. This one though, has him pretty well surpassing himself, because, of course, we are now invested in each Slow Horse.
As ever I can’t give any information (or very little) on this one, as each reader deserves to read in innocence, in order to get the greatest level of involvement and commitment to each of Herron’s wonderful cast of characters

As in book 3 the main focus from which danger and bad deeds arise is internal – from within the organisation itself, where various individuals struggle for higher status and power over others. Some of the usual suspects are still to be found within MI5, but others are on the rise or fall. Danger of course also lurks without, from those who seek to undermine the system, but some of those within have shady ways of protecting the system, and shadier ways still of protecting their own selves.

The Horses themselves, flawed, flatulent, antisocial and strange as they may be, are still the ones with moral compasses – more than others who stalk these pages, they have a loyalty to each other, however much each of them may violently dislike or despise a fellow Horse

I am minded, whilst we now have a protracted wait whilst Herron decides how much further to ride his horses, to start a prior series by him, following the fortunes of a private detective, but with, no doubt his trademark signatures of sharp writing, wit, danger, strong characterisation, twisty plot – and surprises a plenty

Sadly I was not able to really get into these, lauded though they have been. The odd quirky character is fine but going OTT on the bizarre characters filling this ensemble detracted from what could have been a great plot, really contemporary.

I’ve already written about the first two Jackson Lamb mysteries, which manage to be both exciting and funny. I’d been planning to save up Real Tigers but then NetGalley offered me Spook Street so I had to read the two one after the other. You do need to read this series in order, so that you can keep up with the changes at Slough House and in the higher regions of the Service.

This fourth Jackson Lamb mystery opens with a terrorist massacre in a shopping mall. In tracking down the suicide bomber River Cartwright and the other slow horses discover that the outrage has its origins in France and that there are more fanatics on the loose. Everything is complicated by the obvious involvement of River’s grandfather, David; a legend once but now succumbing to dementia. Yet again we find that with friends like MI5, Britain hardly needs external enemies. I could hardly put this book down and am looking forward to the next instalment, if there is one.

The fourth in the Slough House series, Slough House being the place where the not so great spies end up, these are the ones who make a stupid mistake and end up paying greatly for it. With Jackson Lamb at it's head this is not the typical spy novel where all is well and great, expect dark humour, characters filled with cynicism and self hatred. A must for fans of John le Carre.

What happens to spies when they get old? This is the intriguing question posed by Spook Street. Former senior spy David Cartwright is showing the early signs of dementia. He wanders round his village in his pyjamas, convinced that the flickering streetlights are a code, and that the local shopkeeper’s small talk is an interrogation. What might he reveal in his confusion?

His grandson, River Cartwright, is one of the misfit spies exiled to Slough House under Jackson Lamb (the so-called Slow Horses). He is concerned about his grandfather and wants to take care of him before the Service move to ‘take care of him’ in another sense.

At first I found it hard to orient myself in the present day, particularly as this was my introduction to Slough House. I’m a big fan of John le Carré and I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was back in the world of Smiley. The grotty building, the sluggish central heating, the air of ennui, the animal terminology (stoats and horses rather than moles) – Even the cadence of the prose echoes le Carré. It’s only the references to technology that hurtle you back to the present day.

But this is more than Smiley with iPods. I soon warmed (if that’s the right word) to the Slow Horses. They are flawed but clever, unlikeable to varying degrees (likeability is, in my view, a much-overrated quality in a fictional character) but always interesting.

One way Spook Street differs from le Carré is that no one here seems to much believe in anything. In Smiley’s world, people are motivated at times by principle, even if they’re not the principles they’re supposed to have. Here the ambitious are motivated by their own power and status, while the employees at Slough House seem to have enough to do just to make it through the day.

A lot of contemporary spy fiction, and crime in general, seems to be high in concept and low in substance. Fast food for the eyeball, with clockwork characters marching through the obligatory twists. This is the opposite. The plot is the plot, and is probably best not examined too closely, but the prose is rich and satisfying and funny in the darkness and bleak in the light. There are complex, grown up characters and a world in Slough House that may owe a debt to le Carré but clearly has a life of its own. A world that lives and breathes and which you are sure is still there when you have stopped reading. I’ll definitely be back.

I just couldn't get past all the juvenile language being used to find the storyline. Not my kind of book.

Thanks to the John Murray team for the chance to read and review this book.
This is the fourth exploit of Jackson Lamb and his team that I have read. Skulduggery in the world of spies is a fascinating idea and Lamb is a wonderful creation. The last two 'adventures' have strayed a little too close to the '007' world for my liking but I have enjoyed them all the same. Some have compared Mick Herron to John Le Carre, I am not sure that I would go that far, but certainly he writes a good story and has imagined many devious plots to write about. Rogue agents, family ties, slick one liners and humour abound in 'Spook Street', more Jackson Lamb and less James Bond please.

I first came across Mick Herron last year when I reviewed Real Tigers, Herron’s third book in the Slough House series. Spook Street is number four in the series, a book I’ve been waiting for which means expectations have been high!

So, what’s it about? Slough House is the Intelligence Service’s place of exile for washed up spooks that can’t be fired or just pensioned off. The team is led by Jackson Lamb, an odd character that you should never turn your back to or underestimate, simply because he’s rude and abrasive. He’s also enormously protective of his team of no hopers, although he never openly shows it. River Cartwright is one of Lamb’s original team of rejects, whose father, known affectionately as the OB (old bastard) was also in the intelligence services.
Long retired, the OB is succumbing to dementia and the risk is that one day he may blurt out some of the many secrets he’s go locked up in his ageing mind. Perhaps that’s what leads someone to try to kill him and seemingly succeeded in River too. The novel follows Lamb and his team figuring out the who, what and why of this mystery, quickly making the link to a horrific suicide bombing at a shopping centre. It seems the OBs past isn’t as dead as everyone thought it was!

So what did I think? Absolutely loved it! The cast of misfits and no hopers is great and superbly stitched together into a wonderful tapestry of action by Lamb – he’s coarse and vulgar but sharp as a tack, energising his team in a way only he can, to get to the bottom of the conundrum of why someone tried to kill the OB. The plot is great building on the backstory of the Slough House characters we’ve met in previous novels and the simple idea of what do you do with retired spooks who know too much and start getting careless about who they talk to. Its underpinned by a sinister thread running through the novel of Machiavellian plotting and cover up by the mainstream intelligence services, who simply can’t be trusted with anything.

And the pace. Fantastic – a mix of action, understated tension and some genuine noir scenes that build into a brilliant crescendo. Oh, one more thing – Herron has no worries about killing off characters, so don’t be surprised by the body count, or by whose corpses are being counted on the kill list

Final verdict – a cracking book. A spy novel that reflects the cynical age that we live in, which makes it exactly the kind of book that I want to be reading. Good as a standalone novel, but if you’ve not read the other three, you’re really missing out on a treat – read them all!

Romancrimeblogger

Mick Herron’s Slow Horses books burst into my consciousness late last year with Real Tigers, the third in the series: this one is the fourth, just out now.

And yes, it is just as good: funny, full of memorable characters, some great situations, and an all-too convincing picture of the security services in modern-day England. As when a security breach in 1992 is mentioned:
‘Ninetytwo?’ This was the defence minister. ‘That’s ancient history.’
Whelan suspected he was trying to remember who’d been in government then; whether this was something that could be passed off on the other party.
I even forgive Herron for the character called The Moira – ‘they’d taken to calling her [that]; one of those unplanned habits that foster relationships… ‘Moira, anyway’ she said. ‘That’s an oldies’ name. Your aunt’s called Moira.’ She’s later described as ‘Grendel’s mother through there’.

The plot is labrynthine, clever and scarey, but as ever it’s the one-liners that amuse. Shirley has a new hairdo:
‘It makes me look like a young Mia Farrow’ she said, ‘if she’d been dark instead of blonde.’
‘Yeah’ said Lamb ‘And if she’d eaten Frank Sinatra instead of marrying him.’
Jackson Lamb, a towering figure, one of the finest creations in modern literature, always gets the best lines.
‘You’re not having a panic attack are you?’ Lamb asked kindly.
‘No.’
‘Does the thought of having one frighten you?’

Talking of a colleague:
‘We speak on the phone, we sometimes meet up. Every now and then she tries to have me killed.’ He shifted a buttock. ‘I can’t remember if I’ve ever been married, but it sounds like that’s what it’s like.’
Speaking of one character’s ambitions:
‘[He was worried about an issue] that might scupper his chances of getting to be First Desk, right? These days they appear on Newsnight, reviewing Bond films. But back then, the whole secrecy thing was more of an issue.’
‘He never wanted to be First Desk.’
‘Uh-huh. And Buzz Lightyear never wanted to be first man on the Moon.’
‘I don’t think you mean Lightyear.’


I would read about Jackson and his team even if there was no plot, but I did foresee some of the twists in this one – which I didn’t in the first couple of the books. Herron specializes in making the reader feel clever for guessing, then adding another twirl to take you by surprise. There was less of that this time. (Or maybe I’m getting cleverer? – Nah.)
But truly this is a marvellous series, and anyone who likes spy stories, or being entertained, will enjoy them.

Just as good as Real Tigers. I wish I had read the first 2 books instead of starting with book 3 not realising it was part of a series. It's a spy story with idiosyncratic characters and a heavy dash of humour. The author has managed a good mix of story, character and action. Can't wait to read the next in the series.

Another fantastic read about the 'slow horses' at Slough House !! This time , we are concerned about David Cartwright, ex spy, who appears to be suffering memory loss and consequently might be at risk of forgetting that secrets should remain so. A lovely quote from the book, ' Nothing is more frightening to lose your wits when you have spent your life living on them'.
River Cartwright is concerned about his grandfather, but then a bomb blast at a local shopping centre kills forty people and suddenly there is more to worry about. Could his grandad have some past involvement in this atrocity in his previous spy days and who is River's doppelgänger who tries to murder David? The search for answers takes River to France where we learn disturbing facts about a sinister commune, his long lost mother and what grandad actually did.
These books about the incompetent spies of Slough House are enormous fun. They are comical and playful, full of abuse and sarcastic humour, absorbing and sly and this book is full of red herrings, in short, the complete opposite of James Bond and John Le Carre. Slough House is presided over by Jackson Lamb who is smelly and always farting, he gets under everyone's skin, but when danger is on their doorstep, incompetent spies rise to the occasion magnificently.
I reviewed book three, Real Tigers recently and so enjoyed that book, that I have bought the first two, can I recommend this series more highly? If you have a taste for fast action and black humour then look no further. A five star read indeed.
I have today posted this review on Goodreads. My honest opinion is, can't wait for the next one! .

Mick Herron just writes THE best spy and espionage series in the world. When I read Slow Horses I was slowly enveloped into this world, I've been a huge fan ever since. Quirky, funny, emotional, with characters that just leap off the page, it is entirely beautiful to read and so intensely absorbing that it takes an age to come back to reality.

This instalment finds River worried about family - and in a family of spies it ain't the usual worry. Changes have been afoot at Slough House due to previous events and gosh how I love the descriptive scenes of what goes on within, its like coming home after a long trip away. Here, with a hard hitting opening that the author then brings back to his meandering, gorgeously plotted, slow burn to the finale, Spook Street takes the quality of this series up a notch. Well several notches.

I mean really its just great great writing. Witty, ironic, intelligent you name something you want from a book its probably in here. HUGELY entertaining conversational pieces are embedded within the wider story which is utterly gripping, totally captivating and ultimately satisfying. This author knows how to put a finish on things.

I genuinely cannot recommend this series highly enough.

**Review can also be found on Goodreads and Amazon.

I found this book very slow and wordy in the beginning. As I had not read any previous books about these characters I found it very difficult to follow and do not really see it as a stand alone book. Unfortunately it was not for me.

I've written before about how I share a love of books with my parents and how my Dad and I in particular have similar taste in novels. A few years ago he told me about a book he'd read called Slow Horses by Mick Herron which was about a group of MI5 spies who have been packed off to Slough House, a grubby outpost of the intelligence service which houses those members who have messed up in some way. Headed up by the disgustingly hilarious Jackson Lamb they spend their days trawling through CCTV looking for suspicious number plates and pushing paper whilst the rest of the service prevent terror attacks and keep Britain safe. I fell in love with the sharp storytelling, clever writing and adored the character of Jackson Lamb; a man who has a cracking turn of phrase, horrible habits, is an HR Manager's nightmare but has the backs of his staff (although he'd never tell them). On top of this Mick Herron is from the North East (although he now lives in Oxford) and I like to support a fellow Geordie despite his defection to the South.

Spook Street is book 4 in the series and, although they are stand alone novels, I would recommend reading them in order to enjoy them to their fullest. Spook Street tells the story of the Grandfather of River Cartwright (the protagonist of book 1) who is a retired Spy and is becoming ill with dementia. River is worried about him, but not as much as MI5 because a Spook who is losing his memory is likely to spill secrets best kept unsaid. The book starts with a terrorist attack in London and whilst MI5 are dealing with the aftermath and negotiating politics in the corridors of power, River's Grandfather, David is convinced he is being followed and there is somebody out to kill him.

I've been intrigued about David Cartwright since the first novel where we discover that he brought up River after his mother abandoned him. River is one of my favourite characters and a bit of a book crush for me so I was really pleased when I learnt that Spook Street would revisit River and we'd learn more about his and his Grandfather's back story. Spanning decades from the time just after the fall of the Berlin Wall to the present day and moving between the UK and France we are privy to some wonderful moments of spycraft interspersed with some wonderful action sequences. Spook Street is full of twists and turns; there were a couple of moments where I gasped out loud at Mick Herron's deft storytelling.

Despite the sometimes gruesome subject matter of these novels I always feel that I'm settling down with old friends when I read about the exploits of the group of misfits at Slough House. In the words of my Dad, there's a laugh on every page, whether that is from Jackson Lamb's own personal brand of humour or Roddy Ho's arrogance at finally getting a girlfriend (and a whole new wardrobe in honour of this momentous occasion) these books never fail to disappoint. If you enjoy clever writing, spy and thriller novels, a bit of humour in your books and you're not easily offended then this is the series for you.

Thank you to the publishers John Murray press and NetGalley for an advanced copy of this book in return for an honest review, this is one of my favourite series of books so it was a pleasure to read and review, especially as I was able to read it before my Dad :-).

I have to admit that I was not grabbed by the beginning of this book. But for the fact that I was expected to provide a review of it, I would have most likely set it aside. But I am glad I persevered. The book covers the events of less than one week in a recent dreary January in London and France., As the plot unfolds, increasing amounts of a welcome back-story are provided, adding to my enjoyment as I attempted to solve the various mysteries surrounding the intelligence officers involved. Towards the end, I couldn't put it down, which, to me, is the sign of a good book.

I am grateful to the publisher and Netgalley for providing me with a copy of the book in exchange for this honest review.

Spook Street is the fourth in the Slough House (or Slow Horses) series by Mick Herron. Slough House is the dumping ground for Secret Service employees who have seriously failed on the job but cannot be sacked, the bunch of misfits and discontents are plagued with mind numbing tasks and tormented by their boss Jackson Lamb in an endeavour to get them to take early retirement. You never get to find out what Lamb did to get sent to Slow House but he clearly carries some punch with the top level of the Service that keeps him in his job and protects his staff.

The novel starts with an ageing retired spy who is suffering from the onset of dementia, an attempt on his life that brings into question how the Service would deal with a spy who became a potential risk, a suicide bomber in a shopping centre and the murder of one of the Slow Horses. Spook Street combines a very contemporary plot with lots of allusions to current politics and security concerns with a cover up within the Service of a misjudged and out of control operation that dates back nearly 30 years and inevitably lots of ‘office’ politics.

If you want to give the Slough House series a try I encourage you to start at the beginning with Slow Horses followed by Dead Lions and Real Tigers, then read Spook Street

Mick Herron is writing some of the best modern spy thrillers in the UK. Gripping, clever, unsettling, highly believable and drily humorous. I can’t recommend him enough.