Ascension

Written by Oliver Harris

Narrated by James Langton

British spy Elliot Kane is forced out of semi-retirement to investigate a colleague’s suspicious death on Ascension Island, a remote and rocky outpost of the British military in the middle of the Atlantic.

Despite foiling a plot to incite a new world war, Elliot Kane has been on probation with MI6 since his rogue misadventures in Kazakhstan. Granted a job teaching literature to college students, he surprisingly enjoys a conventional life away from the intelligence services. Then a former colleague reaches out with a request: one of her tech specialists on a long-term, covert mission has killed himself, and the agency needs to find out why before proceeding with the vital operation. The carrot in this offer is helping his old friend; the stick is more disciplinary action if he doesn’t comply. So Kane takes on deep cover again and heads to one of the most remote places on the planet, Ascension Island.

A curious legacy of England’s imperial past, Ascension is a desolate rock made of dead volcanic cones located in the Atlantic Ocean halfway between Brazil and Angola. Only employees and their families are allowed to reside there, and the island contains both British and American military bases. After learning that a teenage girl disappeared on the same night as the technician’s suicide, Kane finds himself with two mysteries to solve. With local tensions running high, he needs to move quickly before suspicion falls on him. Kane soon realizes the island has more secrets than even the government knows, some leading straight to the highest offices in London. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: HarperAudio
• Release date: Jul 13, 2021
• ISBN: 9780358449423

Oliver Harris

Oliver Harris has an MA in creative writing from the University of East Anglia, in addition to degrees in English and Shakespeare studies, and recently received his PhD. His first novel, The Hollow Man, launched the Detective Nick Belsey series. He also reviews for the Times Literary Supplement. He lives in London.

Reviews for Ascension

[karatelpek · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A solid 2nd chapter in the Elliot Kane Series. I liked the first 2/3 of the novel as the mystery of the murder on the island was compelling. Kane's arrival made it feel like a western when a stranger arrives to an old dusty town caught up in strife. The final 1/3 was more Moonraker than mystery, but it was still a good read overall.

[eyejaybee · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I was a bit hesitant about starting this novel. Unlike everyone else I know who had read it, I had struggled with Oliver Harris’s previous novel, A Shadow Intelligence, which introduced the character of Elliott Kane who is also the protagonist of Ascension. My concerns were misplaced, however, and I found this a gripping and entertaining novel.Thea action all takes place on Ascension Island, a rocky outcrop in the South Atlantic. Its remote location lends a considerable military significance, and it has large American and British military bases. It is so remote that there are no direct flights to it – anyone wishing to visit has to travel first to St Helena (famous as the home in exile of Napoleon after the Battle of Waterloo), several hundred miles away, and then take a bumpy flight in a small plane.Kane has left the Intelligence Service after the events chronicled in A Shadow Intelligence, but is lured back to participate in an ‘off-the-books’ operation to infiltrate the island to investigate the apparent suicide of a former colleague. In such a small, parochial community, a newcomer stands out anyway, and Kane’s wish not to attract attention is further stymied when, on his first night on the island, he has to intervene when he sees a group of adults attacking a teenaged boy. He discovers that feelings are running high on the island following the disappearance of a teenaged girl, known to have been close to the boy in question.Meanwhile, against this backdrop, there are indications that a secret operation to tap a major telecommunications node which is being established on the island may have been compromised. It is fears over the integrity of this operation (so secret that it is known to only a very few of the highest ranked officers in the service) that prompted the Service to commission Kane to return to action.Harris is very good at keeping the tension, with the action moving between Kane’s exploits on Ascension Island and his handler’s activities back home where she shuttles between GCHQ and Thames House. I also enjoyed the descriptions of the island itself. Obviously, I have no way of determining how accurate they are, but they convinced me, and I could almost feel the relentless gale blowing across the island.