Product Review

Some say Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service is riddled with misfits and losers. Alec Cunningham, Annabel Gould, Gina Fairburn, Phyllis Robinson and Ian Woodward have each experienced life in extremis and washed up subtly broken. Yet in 21st century, post-imperial Britain, they – and people like them - are all that stands between security and turmoil.

When a cabal of Russian oligarchs instigates unrest in the far east of Russia as the first stage of an attempt to unseat Vladimir Putin, Britain offers covert support in the form of these same five agents. The disturbances mirror those in Eastern Ukraine and, if pushed far enough, might persuade the Kremlin to retract its territorial interests in Donetsk, Luhansk and Zaporizhia.

However, once the operatives are shipped east, events take an unexpected turn. One by one, they begin to disappear.

Enter Grey Department’s John Mordred. Latter-day beatnik, loner, mystic, linguistic genius; by grudging consensus, MI7’s best agent. ‘Best’, that is, apart from one little flaw: an obstinate habit of obeying his conscience when the chips are down. He may be very, very good in a crisis, but fatally, he won’t necessarily defend the realm.

Tales of MI7 is an open-ended catalogue of “current affairs thrillers” with a literary flavour. Each volume consists of a story complete in its own right.

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Categories: Political thrillers, MI6 and MI5 novels, spy thrillers set in Britain, Putin and Eastern Ukraine novels, Secret Service thrillers from the UK, British intelligence novels set in Vladivostok in Siberia in eastern Russia, English espionage thrillers, literary spy fiction, current affairs fiction.