The sixth directorate

In prison his name had been Peter Marlow. When British Intelligence released him to impersonate a dangerous KGB agent, he became George Graham, a man with an incredible past, and with a very questionable future. But even the British didn't know everything about Graham. There were secrets within secrets, as Marlow discovered. Then he came face to face with George Graham's mistress and thought the game was up. But it was just the beginning . . . 'Intelligent, sharp and deviously plotted . . . Here is a new force in the field of spy stories.' Daily Telegraph 'Unusual, thinking man's thriller . . . with echoes of writers like Greene and le Carre and a continual convincing atmosphere of uneasy menace and grey betrayal.' Sunday Express 'Joseph Hone's The Sixth Directorate . . . is one of the best suspense novels of the last ten years. It has elegance, wit, sympathy, irony, surprise, action, a rueful love affair and a melancholy 'Decline of the West' mood. Only the crimes in its pages separate the book from what is known as serious novels.' Anatole Broyard, New York Times 'Fast, sophisticated, splendidly authentic, Joseph Hone writes like an angel about devil's work.' Charles McCarry This is the second of Joseph Hone's Peter Marlow's spy novels, the other three being The Private Sector, The Valley of the Fox and The Flowers of the Forest. All are being reissued in Faber Finds.