October Song (ePub)

'Superlative.' 'Reminded me of Iain Banks at his fiery best.' Gary Gibson, award-nominated author of Angel Stations and Stealing Light.

'An absolute piledriver of a dark future thriller that instantly hooks you and doesn't let go till the end. Horribly believable and utterly compelling.' Neil Williamson, author of The Moon King and Thirty Years of Rain.

'A grim and gripping near-future thriller with sharp political edges and scarily plausible projections, rooted in intimate knowledge of real places.' Ken MacLeod, award-winning author of The Star Fraction and The Night Sessions.

Following a devastating bomb attack outside the North British Council Building at Holyrood in Edinburgh, a police officer finds herself fleeing from her employers and MI5, the domestic counter-intelligence and security agency of the United Kingdom, up the west coast of the territory of North Britain towards the front line of an intensifying war.

But it's not just her pursuers she must beware of. The wild coastline has become a hiding place for desperate boat-borne refugees. Meanwhile, someone unknown seems to be going to extraordinary and ever more lethal lengths to stop her pursuers finding her.

October Song is both a darkly gripping roller-coaster ride and a blistering reflection on a world on the edge of collapse.

'The little electric hatchback had vaulted cleanly over a drystone wall, mangling itself as it ploughed a furrow down a steep bank, flipping on to its side as it hit a half-buried boulder and slamming to a stop against a tree. As she sat suspended, watching airbags deflate, she could hear police sirens approaching. She didn't dare move. Perhaps three minutes later, a police convoy screamed past. As if it would help her, she sat stock still as the sirens were killed. Flashing red and blue lights illuminated tree-tops where the vehicles had pulled up a few hundred metres further on.'

'As she drifts into the narrows there's a noise from downwind, somewhere in front of her. She squints into the dark and raises her binoculars again. What the …? Some kind of battle is taking place on the bridge. Breathing very fast, she strains for details. Even in moonlight, it's too dim for her night vision to make out much. There's a scrum of movement, and a growing roar of voices. And clanging – lots of clanging. Also thumps, like haunches of meat being dropped on a floor. She sees a flash of something bright and metallic. There are screams. Something falls noisily off the bridge right in front of her, barely three kayak lengths away.'

Thriller Categories:

·  Female protagonist

·  Noir

·  Conspiracy

·  Terrorism

·  Chase

·  Scotland

·  Britain