A quick cheat read from my growing selection of novellas from PS Publishing. I only know Stephen Baxter's name from his collaberations with Terry Pratchett (which I shamefully haven't read, or indeed bought, yet). Still if Pratchett was willing to team up with him for three books, he must have something going for him.
And on the strength of this he probably does. This is a fun little romp through a very fictionalised late 60's where the John Steed and Emma Peel Avengers series was based on a real agency who were using it to hide in plain sight.
A mysterious company, known as the company, is producing advanced technology and, through a magazone known as Magazine, is making the nation's children produce strange toys from kits known as kits whilst they listen to endless guitar solos broadcast from the Company's own pirate radio station known as... the station.
There's a lot of ground covered in this book in a very short number of pages. We have assassins attempting to kill ex-soldiers to stop them killing an ex-nazi scientist who holds vital information about the company. We have a pair of agents trying to take down the evil version of Radio Caroline. We have a good cop trying to reconnect with her stepson who is under The Company's control. Oh, and a potential alien invasion from within, setting the groundwork for invaders from beyond the Solar system to swoop in and destroy humanity.
The characters are as developed as you can get in such a short book. The prose is witty and to the point. It's not laugh out loud funny but I did have either a broad smile or an ironic grin on my face for most of the time I was reading this.
It's still available from PS Publishing. If short and witty take-downs of 60's tv sci fi are your thing, go ahead and buy it. You won't regret it.
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