by Samantha Lee Howe

One More Chapter, out now in ebook; in paperback in June

A killer, trained from childhood; a Security Service agent tracked with finding her. When their paths cross, their lives change forever.

There are two sorts of spy stories – ones that try to extrapolate from the known facts about the real organisations in the world, and others that use their trappings to tell a more fantastical tale. John Le Carré would fit into the former; James Bond, or the more recent versions of the Treadstone mythology for Jason Bourne, the latter. Killing Eve is also a wonderfully fantastical foray into this world – and Samantha Lee Howe’s new trilogy, of which this is the first volume, fits the bill too.

There’s a lot that feels familiar about the set up but Howe plays with the various tropes in differing ways. There’s what feels like a load of coincidences involved, but there’s good reason for at least some of them. We get the majority of the story told from two viewpoints – Neva, an assassin who’s questioning her actions; and a first person narrative from Michael Kensington, an operative for a department within MI5 (which, slightly annoyingly, is never referred to properly as Five in dialogue between its agents). There’s also a few chapters told from other characters, although in at least one case, this does feel as if it’s being used as an opportunity for an infodump for material the author needs us to know.

Howe uses a very direct style of prose that keeps you engaged, and leaves the reader with a number of questions at the end of the story, which will hopefully be addressed in the two sequels coming over the next few months. If you’ve enjoyed Killing Eve – or even a fan of the Black Widow or the Winter Soldier – you’ll get a kick from this.

Verdict: An intriguing start to a trilogy of spy tales. 7/10

Paul Simpson

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