A wonderfully well written story which brought the past to the present seamlessly.

A joy to read but no more than I expected.

I especially enjoyed the Berlin history and how it impacted on his up to date characters.

A first class story teller with an excellent list of players.

Beautifully written as always, it’s a total joy to read the back stories of some of the characters in his other books, and find out what made them the way they are.

Skip read this book. Just wanted it to be over, and thankfully that is now the case.

Ok, so we now get to know the background to a lot of the characters but really, did it have to be so long winded? A lot of it I speed read or skipped as it didn’t give any substance to the story, in my opinion. Having said that I am now up to speed on how the characters worked and how they got where they are now. Some very interesting stuff. So pleased I gave it a go and stuck with it.

Loved it. Ties a lot of previous storylines together so well. You need to read the Slow Horses series first (time well spent).

Wonderfully descriptive, the small details brought to life. Read the Slow Horses series before reading this and the characters will be alive as they appear.

Highly recommended.

Really struggled to follow the meandering narrative. No idea why we are transitioning or what the link between story lines are. Repetitive humour. One of the worst books I’ve attempted to read in a long time.

The Jackson Lamb series are simply excellent so it was with some trepidation that I started this slightly tangential prequel to the excellent Slough House genre. I need not have feared though as this is a really good standalone novel, albeit also acting as a bit of a prequel to some of the Jackson Lamb associated characters. It’s well worth the read with the traditional humour, good plot and treachery.

.. a very lengthy maturation process, but the long distilling taste was ultimately sublime.

Some might call it a parody of the main attraction, yet this would be unfair. Paradoxically, what I call the main attraction is itself, ultimately a parody of the historical main attraction which we glimpse here in this story.

I think Mr Herron has found the answer to the big question “how to move forward with the project?”. The answer being: look to history!

A flux of familiar characters, albeit ‘masked’ somewhat to start with. A host of the typical bureaucracy in government and civil service.

Yarns, webs, & tales spun together in seemingly disjointed fashion only to become very well adapted into a grand scheme of things.

All in all, a very satisfactory conclusion and the zoo can get back to some form of banal normality.

Well done, big Mick!

Wow! A very well-crafted book . Respect to the brave spooks who keep Britannia Great . Thank you Mick Herron .

I highly recommend this book . I was completely immersed and the hours I spent reading were wisely invested . I shall be re-reading it and , sadly, I cannot say that is the case with many of the books that I buy . Excellent .