Li Min is a specialist in artificial intelligence perfecting her knowledge of deep fake technology at Harvard University in the USA. At short notice, she’s ordered by the Chinese government to transfer to the University of Oxford in the UK. She’s not a happy student.
Manon Tyler is a young CIA agent who, with the approval of Britain’s MI5, has been charged with encouraging the unhappy student to defect to the West.
Li Min’s extracurricular activity was to report back to her government details of the work being done by other research students at Harvard. She is required to do the same now she’s at Oxford.
The Hidden Hand, the second book in the Manon Tyler series, is gentle, cosy and lacking in excitement. There’s a touch of romance, a bit of sadness and a great deal of incompetence.
Tyler, her CIA manager, and often a representative from MI5 discuss every move to be taken. Consequently there are few surprises and the plot plods along to a predictable ending.
I enjoyed Rimington’s Liz Carlyle series but found The Hidden Hand disappointing.
Reviewed by Clive Hodges
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Dame Stella Rimington joined the Security Service (MI5) in 1968. During her career she worked in all the main fields of the Service: counter-subversion, counter-espionage and counter-terrorism. She was appointed Director General in 1992, the first woman to hold the post. She has written her autobiography and six Liz Carlyle novels.
She lives in London and Norfolk.
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