Jackie’s Reading Corner

SYNOPSIS

Meet Lex Tyler.

She’s a covert operative for Platform Eight, the assassination department of Her Majesty’s Secret Service, and one of the very few women to successfully negotiate the old boy’s network of the espionage world.

She’s smart, resourceful and very deadly- and she’s not your average back-to-work mum.

Her new assignment is a high stakes hit. Her target: Russian oligarch Dmitri Tupolev. But the more she digs into his life, the more Lex wonders if there isn’t a different game going on – one in which she might be an unsuspecting casualty.

With her own family now to worry about, Lex needs to work out who is really pulling the strings, before she too becomes a loose end.

In her world, failure is not an option.

MY REVIEW

This is the first book in what I hope will become a long series of books featuring Alexis Tyler or Lex for short. She is an elite covert agent within Her Majesty’s secret service. James Bond step aside!

Lex however is not just a secret agent, no, she is also a new mum. As the book starts Lex is just returning to work after a short maternity leave, which can be a stressful time for a new mum. The guilt of leaving your baby in the care of someone else. But Lex is determined that becoming a mother will not change anything, she is proud of what she has achieved in a very male dominated world. But will her bosses see her differently?

Lex’s husband thinks she works in a Government office sitting behind a computer all day, but nothing could be further from the truth. She is back to work and is determined to prove that she still has it, that she is more than capable of being a mother and an agent. Working for Platform 8.

Lex has to prove herself capable of pursuing her dangerous line of work now she has become a mother, she has to find a balance between her work and her family, which is never easy, in a normal job let alone when you are an assassin, the men are looking to see if becoming a mum has turned her soft, but they haven’t accounted for Lex’s determination to prove that she can still do her job, failure is not an option. There are a number of twists and turns in the plot and one question is has she been betrayed by a colleague in Platform 8? Or are they just attempting to show her that now she is a mother she is not suitable to be an assassin anymore?

The story which manages to combine the world of London, with the underbelly of society, Lex has a new mission, the mission is to take out a Russian, but to get close to this target she has to get close to his wife, Dasha, who just happens to be a London ‘yummy mummy’ with the ambition of being the yummiest mummy of them all among London’s elite mother set.

Brilliantly written incorporating tension, action, and humour, at times some of the antics are laugh out loud funny. This is the type of book you want to read when you want something to just chill with and enjoy without having to think too hard, that’s not to say that this is not well written or anything like that in fact it’s the opposite. It’s a great read with a lot of fun.

I love the fact that Lex’s daughter Gigi’s prom has a bulletproof cover. The humour is great one funny bit which had me chuckling was when Lex’s Brest pump was thought to be a government issue torture device! Not sure they were far wrong on that one lol.

This is Asia Mackay’s debut novel and it really doesn’t disappoint, it is a great fun read. Whilst addressing some things that women do have to face, that once they become mum’s they are not reliable or no longer capable especially when working in a mainly male environment. It’s a well paced story, with great characters obviously Lex being my favourite, it has a great plot, and at is an unputdownable book until you finish it and then you just want more.

I highly recommend this book and give it ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ out of ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

A half Chinese, half Scottish Londoner, Asia studied Anthropology at Durham university, after which she started a career in television. She presented and produced lifestyle programmes in Shanghai before moving back to London, where she worked for Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman as Project Manager on their round the world motorbike documentaries. She started writing killing it on maternity leave and undertook a Fabre Academy course to help her finish it. Asia lives in London with her husband, four young children and two dogs. Killing it was her first debut novel