The Mick Herron news continues!
On the heels of the announcement of a tv adaption of the Slough House series, Slow Horses, details of a new novella have been released.
News first appeared on twitter and a full description of the book can now be found on Amazon.
The Catch is described as follows –
If life in the Intelligence Service has taught John Bachelor anything, it’s to keep his head down. Especially now, when he’s living rent-free in a dead spook’s flat.
So he’s not delighted to be woken at dawn by a pair of Regent’s Park’s heavies, looking for a client he’s not seen in years. John doesn’t know what secrets Benny Manors has stolen, but they’re attracting the wrong attention. And if he’s to save his own skin, not to mention safeguard his living arrangements, John has to find Benny before those secrets see the light.
Benny could be anywhere, provided it serves alcohol. So John sets out on a reluctant trawl through the bars of the capital, all the while plagued by the age-old questions: Will he end up sleeping in his car? How many bottles of gin can he afford at London prices?
And just how far will Regent’s Park go to prevent anyone rocking the Establishment’s boat?
The US listing has a slightly different description –
John Bachelor is the saddest kind of spy: not a joe in the field, not even a desk jockey, but a milkman—a part-time pension administrator whose main job is to check in on aging retired spies. Late in his career and having lost his wife, his house, and his savings after a series of unlucky choices, John’s been living in a dead man’s London apartment, hoping the bureaucracy isn’t going to catch up with him and leave him homeless. But keeping a secret among spies is a fool’s errand, and now John has made himself eminently blackmailable.
Herron looks to use the novellas to continue the misadventures of Slough House adjacent spy John Bachelor. It does have me anticipating the eventual collection of all of his Slough House novellas and short stories.
Release of the book is currently listed as January 9th, 2020 in Hardcover and Kindle in the UK and January 28th in the US for a Paperback and Kindle.
Book Depository offers free worldwide shipping for those who can’t wait.