A Shadow Intelligence cover art

A Shadow Intelligence

an utterly unputdownable spy thriller

 Preview

Get 30 days of Standard free

£5.99/mo after trial. Cancel monthly.
Try for £0.00
More purchase options

A Shadow Intelligence

By: Oliver Harris
Narrated by: Richard Coyle
Try for £0.00

£5.99 a month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy Now for £14.35

Buy Now for £14.35

LIMITED TIME OFFER

£0.99/mo for 3 months - terms apply. Offer ends 31 August 2026.
'Oliver Harris is always pure quality and I'm loving the hell out of his foray into the contemporary spy novel' Ian Rankin


The intelligence service puts two years and over £100k into the training of new field officers. You're shown how to steal cars, strip weapons, hack bank accounts. There are courses on the use of blackmail and improvised explosives, two workshops solely dedicated to navigating by the stars. But nothing about what I had heard one old spy call whiplash. No one tells you how to go home.

There is a dark side to MI6 that needs men like Elliot Kane - mercurial, inquisitive, free floating. He's spent fifteen years managing events overseas that never make the papers, deniable and deeply effective. Kane is a ghost in his own life, picking up and dropping personalities as each new cover story comes into play. But when a woman he loves, Joanna Lake, vanishes without a trace in Kazakhstan, he is forced centre stage.

Drawn ever deeper into a realm of deception, Kane moves from merely infiltrating events to steering them. He's used to a new mode of hybrid psychological warfare - but snowbound Kazakhstan presents unique challenges. Poised between China, Russia and the West, dictatorship and democracy, state intelligence and an increasingly powerful world of private agencies, it's impossible to work out who is manipulating who. And Kane's not the only one trying to figure out where Joanna Lake has gone or what she learned before disappearing.

Unable to trust anyone, hunted by his own colleagues, and with the life of someone he loves at stake, Kane needs to work out who is driving events, and why...©2019 Oliver Harris Espionage Genre Fiction Military Romantic Suspense Spies & Politics Suspense Thriller & Suspense War & Military Thriller Fiction Russia
adbl_web_anon_alc_button_suppression_t1

Critic reviews

Elliot Kane needs his wits about him to keep track of his own identities and those of fellow MI6 agent Joanna, who he's looking for in Kazakhstan. The binary simplicity of the Cold War has been replaced by a geopolitical Rubik's cube of corruption, nationalism, oil money and internet deceit. Tremendous evocation of modern Kazakhstan and the contemporary intelligence landscape. Scary if true, or even half true.
Sharp writing and provocative content
Elliott Kane is an unusually thoughtful spy... As much a thinker as a doer, Kane has much in common with le Carré's Jerry Westerby or Lionel Davidson's Johnny Porter, a plausibly multi-faceted old school operator with the skills - physical, psychological, intellectual - to negotiate the geopolitical faultlines of central Asia as Russia and China square up over Kazahstan's untapped oil reserve
A Middle East specialist, flies to Astana in Kazakhstan to search for his former colleague and lover Joanna, and gets caught up in the jostling for power, deals and intelligence in a city portrayed as becoming a 21st-century mecca for spooks . . . Classier writing, fresher characters, original setting, a real sense of insider lore (on both spycraft and geopolitics)
A splendid thriller with new perspectives on places and the distinctly unclean side of the great game of espionage
A masterful entry into spy fiction. This may be the deepest a contemporary spy novel has penetrated the cold new world of dark web intelligence...An absorbing, superbly written novel likely to stand as one of the best spy novels of the year
A gripping, fast-moving and intelligent novel from new spy fiction star Oliver Harris which will leave readers wanting a lot more Elliot Kane adventures
Elliot Kane is highly-trained MI6 spook. So highly-trained that he's pretty much forgotten who the hell he really is after years of false identities and subterfuge...In a deadly world of deception by just about every nasty state, and that includes his own, he's truly up against it in this complex thriller that keeps you on your toes throughout
An intelligent and thoroughly researched spy-procedural giving razor-sharp insight into the particular challenges of 21st-century espionage
A twisting spiral of lies and corruption, a pitch-perfect portrait of contemporary London and a beguiling bastard of a hero
All stars
Most relevant
I held off on this audiobook initially, due to some of the negative reviews. When I eventually took the plunge, I was completely gripped by the complexities of the storyline. This is without a doubt the beat story of espionage that I have heard. The depth of detail in spy tradecraft, along with the cutting edge geopolitical issues drew me in and didn’t let me go.

The narration is outstanding - to the point where I will be looking to source other books narrated by Richard Coyle. I’ll certainly be keeping my fingers crossed for future Oliver Harris works narrated by Coyle.

I cannot recommend this book highly enough. If you’re unsure, take the chance. Pay close attention to the intricacies of the storyline and you won’t be disappointed.

Utterly compelling

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Super book. Good Narration as well. The books is very attention to detail, and paints a great picture of the spy community. Dont expect James Bond, "exploding pens" etc. Its a story of how a real spy's operates in the world. The story is fairly complicated and takes some following, but its sensually a ex Spook looking for his Ex (love interest). I will definitely read the follow up book.

Super book. Good Narration as well.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
The narrator was amazing, clear and kept me wanting to listen. I don't normally like too much detail but this was like watching a film, it felt like i had been to these places and met these people. My 1st modern spy thriller, thank you for introducing this author to me, Ben Willbond, on Between the Covers.

Great detail and atmosphere

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Fascinating concept of a plot. Minor mistakes in geography and pronunciation... A very good book to contemplate for those interested in geo-politics.

Very good book to contemplate.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
an example of how the world espionage services & the information they gather or supplant, are used by the super powers for thier own ends in thier attempt to create and frame the narratives required for the constant and ongoing game of global chess.

superb

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
See more reviews