Why We Die

Monochrome is a busted flush - an inquiry into the misdeeds of the intelligence services, established by a vindictive prime minister but rendered toothless by a wily chief spook. For years it has ground away uselessly, interviewing witnesses with nothing to offer, producing a report with nothing to say, while the civil servants at its helm see their careers disappearing into a black hole. And then the OTIS file falls into their hands. What secrets does this hold that see a long-redundant spook being chased through Devon's green lanes in the dark? What happened in a newly reunified Berlin that someone is desperate to keep under wraps? And who will win the battle for the soul of the secret service - or was that decided a long time ago? Spies and pen-pushers, politicians and PAs, high-flyers, time-servers and burn-outs ... They all have jobs to do in the daylight. But what they do in the secret hours reveals who they really are.

The Instant Sunday Times Bestselling Thriller from the Author of Slow HorsesSUNDAY TIMES, THRILLER OF THE YEARGUARDIAN, CRIME BOOK OF THE YEARDAILY TELEGRAPH, BOOK OF THE YEARTLS, BOOK OF THE YEARTHE SPECTATOR, BOOK OF THE YEAR----'Mick Herron is our best and most topical spy writer' Ian Rankin'Clown Town is a masterpiece' India Knight, Sunday Times'An authentic megastar of the genre' Sam Leith, Guardian'No one can rival Mick Herron' The Times'A superb thriller' The Spectator'Masterly' Times Literary Supplement, books of the year----MI5's First Desk, Diana Taverner, doesn't appreciate threats.So when those involved in a covert operation during the height of the Troubles in Northern Ireland threaten to expose the ugly side of state security, Taverner goes on the offensive. And when that happens, people get hurt.Over at Slough House, the repository for failed spies, the slow horses are hard at work: belittling each other, pushing paper, and marking time. Their boss, Jackson Lamb, wants them at their desks, but the slow horses are always looking for a way back on to Spook Street.Meanwhile, another slow horse, River Cartwright, is waiting to be passed fit for work. At a loose end, and with his grandfather - a legendary former spy - long dead, River investigates the secrets of the old man's library, and a mysteriously missing book. What stories will it hold? And who wants those stories to stay silent? After all, spies lie, they betray, it's what they do.*Mick Herron's Clown Town was a Sunday Times Number Four bestseller in hardback in the second week of September 2025 and a Sunday Times Number Nine bestseller in paperback in the first week of May 2026.

The brand new Slough House thriller from the #1 bestseller Mick Herron*Now an award-winning Apple TV+ series starring Gary Oldman, Kristin Scott Thomas and Jack Lowden*----Spies lie. They betray. It's what they do.Slow horse River Cartwright is waiting to be passed fit for work. With time to kill, and with his grandfather - a legendary former spy - long dead, River investigates the secrets of the old man's library, and a mysteriously missing book.Regent's Park's First Desk, Diana Taverner, doesn't appreciate threats. So when those involved in a covert operation during the height of the Troubles threaten to expose the ugly side of state security, Taverner turns blackmail into opportunity.Over at Slough House, the repository for failed spies, Catherine Standish just wants everyone to play nice. But as far as Jackson Lamb is concerned, the slow horses should all be at their desks.Because when Taverner starts plotting mischief people get hurt, and Lamb has no plans to send in the clowns. On the other hand, if the clowns ignore his instructions and fool around, any harm that befalls them is hardly his fault.But they're his clowns. And if they don't all come home, there'll be a reckoning.Available to pre-order now!

'This tightly plotted tragicomedy will provide a welcome fix for addicts awaiting Herron's seventh Jackson Lamb novel' The Times'Packed with Herron's trademark witty one-liners and sardonic humour . . . it's clear why Herron is a force to be reckoned with and the best thriller writer in Britain today' Daily Express'A slim serio-comic offering . . . It plays out typically cleverly' Sunday TimesIf 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?

*Now an award-winning Apple TV+ series starring Gary Oldman, Kristin Scott Thomas and Jack Lowden*'The new king of the spy thriller' Mail on Sunday'Mick Herron is an incredible writer' Mark Billingham****From the Intelligence Service purgatory that is Slough House, where disgraced spies are sent to see out the dregs of their careers, Jackson Lamb is on his way to Oxford, where a former spook has turned up dead on a bus. Dickie Bow was a talented streetwalker once, good at following people and bringing home their secrets. He was in Berlin with Lamb, back in the day. But he's not an obvious target for assassination in the here and now.On Dickie's phone Lamb finds the last message he ever left, which hints that an old-time Moscow-style op is being run in the Intelligence Service's back-yard. Once a spook, always a spook, and even being dead doesn't mean you can't uncover secrets.Dickie Bow might have tailed his last target, but Lamb and his crew of no-hopers are about to go live.'The spycraft of le Carré refracted through the blackly comic vision of Joseph Heller's Catch-22' Financial Times

A SPECIAL SIGNED ANNIVERSARY EDITION CELEBRATING 15 YEARS OF SLOW HORSESFeaturing an exclusive foreword from Mick Herron and an exclusive essay from Tim Shipman (author of All Out War)With stunning sprayed edges and endpapers, new cover design, ribbon marker and signed by the author, this unmissable one-off special edition is the perfect gift and collector's item for fans of Slow Horses, the basis of the award-winning TV show starring Gary Oldman----'To have been lucky enough to play Smiley in one's career; and now go and play Jackson Lamb in Mick Herron's novels - the heir, in a way, to le Carré - is a terrific thing' Gary OldmanSlough House is the outpost where disgraced spies are banished to see out the rest of their derailed careers. Known as the 'slow horses' these misfits have committed crimes of drugs and drunkenness, lechery and failure, politics and betrayal while on duty.In this drab and mildewed office these highly trained spies don't run ops, they push paper. Not one of them joined the Intelligence Service to be a slow horse and the one thing they have in common is they want to be back in the action.'The most exciting development in spy fiction since the Cold War' The Times'The most enjoyable British spy novel in years' Mail on Sunday'The new spy master' Evening Standard

*Now an award-winning Apple TV+ series starring Gary Oldman, Kristin Scott Thomas and Jack Lowden*'A terrific spy novel' Ian Rankin'A modern masterpiece' Irish Times****Twenty years retired from the Intelligence Service, David Cartwright still knows where all the bones are buried. But when he forgets that secrets are supposed to stay hidden, there's suddenly a target on his back.The 'Old Bastard' raised his grandson to be a hero, not a slow horse. Now, far from joining the myths and legends of Spook Street, River Cartwright is part of Jackson Lamb's team of pen-pushing no-hopers at Slough House. Which doesn't mean he won't ditch everything and go rogue when his grandfather comes under threat.Lamb worked with Cartwright back in the day, and knows better than most that this is no innocent old man. So when a panic button raises the alarm at Intelligence Service HQ, it's Lamb who's called on to identify the body. And it's Lamb who'll do whatever's necessary to protect an agent in peril.'Outstanding' Daily Telegraph

'Masterful . . . superior entertainment that makes most other novels of suspense appear dull and slow-witted by comparison' Publishers WeeklyWhat should have been a simple pick-up turns into a day-long nightmare for Bad Sam Chapman.When an operational catastrophe puts a gun in the hands of a young man, who then breaks into South Oxford Nursery School and takes a group of hostages, teacher Louise Kennedy fears the worst. But Jaime Segura isn't there on a homicidal mission, and he's just as scared as those whose lives he holds as collateral. As an armed police presence builds outside the school's gates, Bad Sam Chapman - head of the intelligence service's internal security force, the Dogs - battles the clock to find out what Jaime is after. But the only person Jaime will talk to is Ben Whistler, an MI6 accountant who worked with Jaime's lover, Miro. Miro's gone missing, along with a quarter of a billion pounds allotted for reconstruction work in Iraq. Jaime refuses to believe that Miro is a thief - though he's always had his secrets. But then, so does Louise, so do the other hostages - and so do some people on the outside, who'd much rather Jaime was silenced.

Something's happened. A lot of things have happened. If she could turn back time, she wondered how far she would go.Twenty-six-year-old Maggie Barnes is someone you would never look at twice. Living alone in a month-to-month sublet in London, with no family but an estranged sister, no boyfriend or partner, and not much in the way of friends, Maggie is just the kind of person who could vanish from the face of the earth without anyone taking notice.Or just the kind of person MI5 needs to thwart an international plot that puts all of Britain at risk.Now one young woman has the chance to be a hero - if she can think quickly enough to stay alive.