[Peter Cotton 03] • Icelight

Winner of the 2012 Ellis Peters Historical Fiction Award, ICELIGHT is the third in the critically acclaimed Peter Cotton series following the fortunes of British spy Peter Cotton as he navigates the treacherous uncertainties of the post-war world. For all fans of John le Carre, Robert Harris, Eric Ambler and Graham Greene. 'Confirms Aly Monroe's genius for creating tension' Daily Telegraph 1947. Threadbare London endures the bleakest, coldest winter for decades. Food rationing is worse than during the war. Coal supplies run out. The Thames freezes over. Against a background of black ice, blackouts and the black market, agent Peter Cotton is seconded to Operation Sea-snake. MI5 is in the grip of civil war; MI6 is riddled with traitors. Unsure who to trust - or even who is pulling the strings - Cotton, ever the outsider, must protect an atomic scientist caught up in a vicious homophobic witch-hunt, limit the damage caused by a bully-boy MP, rely on a rent-boy informer and, despite the murderous attentions of a couple of Glasgow razor boys, embark on a ruthless hunt of his own.