Order of Mick Herron Books

If British spy fiction ever needed a secret weapon, it found one in Mick Herron—a man who twisted the genre's tail and made it snarl, limp, and cackle with wit all at once. Born in Newcastle upon Tyne, England, in 1963, Herron isn’t your typical James Bond enthusiast. No tuxedos. No martinis. Just bureaucratic nightmares, outdated tech, and spies who are as broken as the systems they serve. And yet, that’s exactly what made him a game-changer.

Educated at Balliol College, Oxford, Herron studied English, and if you read his prose, it shows. There's a slyness in every sentence, a turn of phrase that knows it's clever but doesn't care if you notice. He began his writing career with crime fiction—Down Cemetery Road introduced us to Zoë Boehm and the Oxford noir that would soon become his signature—but it was the Slough House series that exploded his reputation like a misplaced MI5 file on a public server.

Ironically, Herron didn’t immediately become a household name. His breakout novel, Slow Horses (2010), was originally a slow burn—almost too apt. Publishers didn’t know what to make of a spy novel starring agents so disgraced they were exiled to a bureaucratic purgatory. But word got out. Readers realized that these anti-heroes—alcoholic, bitter, and decidedly unglamorous—felt disturbingly real. By the time Spook Street and London Rules hit the shelves, Herron had done what no one expected: He’d made the intelligence community look dumb, and the books? Smart as hell.

Though fiercely private (a trait befitting a man who writes about secrets), Herron is very much alive and thriving—no obituary twist here. But if one day a headline reads “Spy Novelist Disappears Under Mysterious Circumstances,” don’t be surprised. He’s already made us believe in fictional MI5 plots buried under London’s grime.

His writing has won numerous accolades, including the CWA Gold Dagger Award and the Theakston’s Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year, but don’t expect him to rest on his laurels. Mick Herron doesn’t chase the limelight. He creates shadowy worlds where limelight gets you killed.

What’s so refreshing—and ironic—is that Herron writes about failures, and yet, he’s anything but. His characters are washed-up, overlooked, and broken… and they’re also some of the most fiercely beloved spies in modern fiction. As you dig deeper into his bibliography, from Nobody Walks to Bad Actors, the one thing that’s certain is that nothing is certain—except a wickedly good read.

So here’s your mission, should you choose to accept it: read Mick Herron. Just don’t expect heroics. Expect mess. Expect laughs. Expect betrayal. And above all, expect to be hooked.

Next stop? Slough House. But don’t get too comfortable—you’re only there if you’ve screwed something up. Or, perhaps, if you’re lucky enough to read the genius who invented it.