Tales of MI7

When someone starts assassinating paparazzi in three countries, MI7 sits up. Apparently, the killer is none other than Dmitri Vassyli Kramski, retired SVR field-operative and former Kremlin protégé. True, the Cold War is long finished, but everyone knows Vladimir Putin is as unhappy for Russia to play second fiddle on the international stage as even the most strident of his Communist predecessors. In 2010 therefore, East-West relations remain as tortuous as ever. Kramski's trail leads deep into London's émigré community, forcing his pursuers into conflict with an unknown organisation bent on protecting him. Bit by bit, he begins to look less like a professional assassin and more like someone plotting to scupper the foundations of Western democracy itself. To compound matters, the Russians are as baffled by him as anyone.

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: a stubborn 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.

In Afghanistan, British secret servicewoman Marcie Brown, posing as the third wife of one of ISAF's most trusted operatives, is killed in a drone strike. Or at least, that's what the official report states. Deep inside enemy territory, what remains of her body is deemed irrecoverable. Seven thousand miles away, her grieving husband, MI7 officer Nicholas Fleming, joins a police investigation which stumbles onto an Islamist plot to bomb central London. Handed responsibility for the counter-terrorism initiative, he uncovers evidence that one of the bombers is his wife. By degrees, the utterly unbelievable becomes plausible and, at last, undeniable. And to make matters worse, there's evidence that she's slowly recovering her memory …

When the 14-year-old daughter of a British government minister leaves the country to join ISIS, MI7 despatches a cohort of agents to Turkey to intercept her en route. However, maybe not everything is as it seems. How to explain, for example, her long-standing prior antipathy to Islamofascism? Her sudden conversion to radicalism on the very day of her departure? The fact that there is neither sight nor sign of her in Istanbul - or elsewhere? Agent John Mordred is assigned to investigate. Soon, he has theories of his own, and they fly in the face of the prevailing wisdom. Along the way, he is forced to face an impossible question. How to account for the appeal, to some British citizens, of an organisation that practises genocide, mass torture and the reduction of women to sex slaves? Barbarism seems to be banging on the doors of civilisation again, in a way unseen since the 1930s. Yet for every evil Mordred uncovers, a counterbalancing good appears. His quest leads him from London to the shores of East Africa, and to a confrontation with the all-pervading power of ideological malice.

April 2016. John Mordred never expected to come under hostile scrutiny from deep within his own organisation. Assigned to investigate the disappearance of a prominent Leave MP, he suddenly finds himself fighting his corner from several different directions. First, there's the anonymous "radicalisation" charge against him; then there's the ever-changing list of major suspects. Even the missing MP may not be all she appears… or appeared. Finally, there's the mysterious "journalist" who keeps reappearing, dangling unspecified evidence of allegedly key significance, and who looks to be in fear of her life. It's a maze, and it seems to have been specifically designed to keep him moving. Meanwhile, behind all the interminable corridors, blind alleys and false leads, wider and darker forces are beginning to emerge in society generally. And they're backed by some of history's most notorious spectres. The New Europeans. Shadowy, ruthless, and coming soon to a country near you.