Thank you to NetGalley for the audiobook ARC of A Duty of Care by Gerald Seymour. A clever, well-paced addition to the Jonas Merrick series. Banished to MI5’s Post Room after stepping on too many toes, Merrick gets drawn into a covert mission involving a Russian gulag, an Albanian courier, and a plan to sabotage elite money laundering networks. The narration was strong, bringing real clarity to the complex plot and giving depth to each character. Merrick is as sharp and driven as ever, and the story feels timely and well researched. A solid, intelligent thriller from Seymour—I’ll definitely be back for the next.

Jonas is genius. What a character; understated in every way. A man of habit bordering on obsessions, with a long suffering wife, Vera who manages his quirky behaviour and a cat who’s a character in his own right. I’ve followed this series which really goes from strength to strength as Jonas becomes embroiled in a series of literally life threatening situations. He’s an enigma. Highly intelligent, unsociable but with empathy and understanding when needed. In the last book, he was due to retire, but he failed to attend his underwhelming retirement party and became involved with a suicide bomber. His retirement plans went awry but he was punished for not following procedure by being sent to the post room at intelligence headquarters. He soon makes a corner if the room alone and his colleagues, at first wary and resentful learn that he holds the QM with bar and that there’s more to him than meets the eye. Gerald Seymour clearly has insight into intelligence operations and he uses his skills to create up to the minute plots which keep the reader gripped from start to finish. This story weaves a number of disparate strands together as he sets up a situation to bring down Russians, Albanians, money laundering and murder. I think Jonas is one of the great creations of modern spy fiction, mainly because he’s so different. Mr Ordinary becomes Mr Extraordinary and I enjoy the way the reader has insight into his inner thoughts. The pace doesn’t let up in this and I enjoyed the audio narration. Simply brilliant, I devoured in a single sitting.
My thanks to the publisher and Netgalley fir a review copy.