Ascension: an absolutely gripping BBC Two Between the Covers Book Club pick (Paperback) - Oliver Harris

British spy Elliot Kane is forced out of semi-retirement to investigate a colleague's suspicious death on Ascension Island, a remote and rocky outpost of the British military in the middle of the Atlantic.

Ascension: the most remote island in the world . . .

Elliot Kane, former spy, trying to leave the world of espionage behind.
Kathryn Taylor: a stalled career in MI6, running the South Atlantic desk.
Rory Bannatyne: covert technical specialist. Dead, apparently of suicide.

Three friends from a mission many years ago reconnect when one of them dies on Ascension Island. Rory Bannatyne had been tasked with tapping a new transatlantic data cable, but a day before he was due to return home he is found hanged. When Kathryn Taylor begs Kane to go over and investigate, he can't say no, but it's an uneasy reintroduction to the intelligence game.

Ascension is a curious legacy of England's imperial past. Only employees and their families are allowed to live there. It's home to several highly-classified government projects, a British and American military base, and forty dead volcanic cones. Entirely isolated from the world, the disappearance of a young girl at the same time as Rory's death means local tensions are high. Elliot needs to discover what happened to her as well as to Rory. But the island contains more secrets than even the government knows, and it's not going to give them up without a fight.

About the Author

Oliver Harris was born in London but now lives in Manchester. He is the author of the Nick Belsey series of crime novels, plus two novels featuring MI6 officer Elliot Kane. He teaches creative writing at Manchester Metropolitan University.