Icelight

Book 3 in the Peter Cotton spy thriller series, for fans of John le Carr and Robert Harris.Winner of the 2012 Ellis Peters Historical Fiction AwardPraise for Aly Monroe'Splendid . . .Monroe provides terrific and convincing historical atmosphere' The Times'Skilful and evocative . . . [a] stylish and impressive debut' The Economist1947. Threadbare London endures the bleakest, coldest winter for decades. Food rationing is worse than during the war. Coal supplies run out. The Thames freezes over. Against a background of black ice, blackouts and the black market, agent Peter Cotton is seconded to Operation Sea-snake. MI5 is in the grip of civil war; MI6 is riddled with traitors. Unsure who to trust - or even who is pulling the strings - Cotton, ever the outsider, must protect an atomic scientist caught up in a vicious homophobic witch-hunt, limit the damage caused by a bully-boy MP, rely on a rent-boy informer and, despite the murderous attentions of a couple of Glasgow razor boys, embark on a ruthless hunt of his own.The Peter Cotton spy thriller series:Book 1: The Maze of CadizBook 2: Washington ShadowBook 3: IcelightBook 2: Black BearShort story: Redeemable