Ascension: an absolutely gripping BBC Two Between the Covers Book Club pick

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'Oliver Harris's Ascension is a stunner. What a pleasure it is to read a book with a powerful story, an unusual and fully realised setting, a convincing hero, all written in a style of luminous clarity' Philip Pullman 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.

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.

One of the best new spy series continues with ex-spook Elliot Kane reluctantly back in harness to investigate the suspicious death of a former colleague on Ascension Island. First-class cloak-and-dagger stuff against an unusual backdrop -- Jake Kerridge * Daily Telegraph * A fascinating tale of modern espionage in a unique setting * Irish Independent * One of our finest thriller writers...Fans of his criminally underrated Belsey novels, about a corrupt London detective, will recognise some familiar themes, including a soft spot for heroic losers and an interest in the physical and mental remains of the Cold War. But it is the location that matters most of all, windswept and staffed by a mixtures of spooks, oddballs and drunks, and it will stay with you long after you close the book * Evening Standard * Harris evokes a powerful sense of place in a landscape where the elements turn out be a character in its own right and the intrigue developing as a result of his investigation quickly sets up a rather frantic and tense finale. A bloody good read! * Maxim Jakubowski, Crime Time * A twisty, propulsive spy thriller, all set against the vividly evoked hellscape of one of the most remote islands in the world * Irish Times * A corker...Harris expertly keeps the plates spinning while breathing thrilling life into the ex-pat community and its moon surface existence * Big Issue * Oliver Harris is always pure quality and I'm loving the hell out of his foray into the contemporary spy novel. Elegant and compulsive' * Ian Rankin, praise for A Shadow Intelligence *