This is a case of it's not you, it's me. I keep trying spy thrillers but alas...they are not my wheelhouse. I strongly disliked Slim Parsons and found nothing enticing, gratifying or fulfilling in what I read of the story so did not finish it. The novel may work very well for other readers.

The Enigma Girl is about Alice "Slim" Parsons, a 4th generation spy. She is one of the most skilled, and obstinate Mi5 agent. While she is undercover her mother is pushed down the stairs and is dying. Slim also is given some news about her estranged brother. Are both connected to what she is investigating while undercover?

It is argued that Henry Porter is this generation’s John le Carre. While not everyone agrees, every time I read a book by Porter, I think of le Carre.

Thank you, NetGalley and Grove Atlantic/ Atlantic Monthly Press. We know I’m a sucker for a good spy thriller. #TheEnigmaGirl #NetGalley

Well, this book wasn’t what I had envisioned it would be, and yet that ended up working out well. Spies, banking, trafficking, and journalism collide in this intriguing tale. There are many twist while they were all interesting, it sometimes felt like they were overdone . I think a few could have been pulled and an excellent story would still have been had.

Despite this, I really liked learning about Slim, her family, and their part in World War II and the Cold War. She is a complex character who manages to get navigate out of every scrape she gets into, but not without some damage to herself or the ones she loves.

What most pulled me into the story was the international mystery and how it connected to local affairs. Was it convoluted at times – yes. Did it make for a gripping story – heck yes! The ending left me curious as to whether the author was going to start a series for Slim, the main character, and if so, then I’m on board to keep reading them.

Thank you Grove Atlantic and Netgalley for my DRC in exchange for my honest opinion.

When Henry Porter’s new espionage novel The Enigma Girl opens readers might be forgiven for thinking they have dropped into the middle of an ongoing series. With great economy Porter establishes his main character Slim Parsons, an MI5 agent in disgrace, living with her mother and working on an archaeological dig in Norfolk. So that very quickly readers will be intrigued by Slim’s backstory and hooked on what comes next. Only there are no previous books, and that backstory is both revealed and comes explosively into play in this tense, page-turning novel.
Slim has just come out of a two year undercover mission to expose a British oligarch that resulted in her traumatised and under investigation but with no consequences for the man she was trying to expose. She is brought out of her forced retirement for another undercover operation as a journalist at a regional newspaper which is about to expose government secrets. It turns out that the paper is run by a group of descendants of code breakers from Bletchley Park, an enterprise that Slim’s Polish ancestors, also spies, had some hand in. At the same time, Slim’s mother is in hospital and Slim seeks the help of MI5 to find her estranged brother while the oligarch that she was trying to expose has learnt that she is still alive and is coming for her.
The Enigma Girl is anchored firmly by Slim - her drive, her initiative and her circle of friends and supporters. Slim joins a long line of loveably flawed, intuitive agents, who takes action when she needs to, and pushes for the right outcome even when it might be at her own expense. She is absolutely a character that readers will cheer for and want to see again. That said, surely in 2025 we are beyond books flagging that they have female protagonist by using the world ‘Girl’ in the title.
The Enigma Girl is great domestic espionage fiction, that centres on real world issues of the purchase of influence, government cover ups and the freedom of the press. Porter delivers a plot with plenty of moving parts, dodgy characters and well written action scenes and which also allow him to delve into a really interesting aspect of World War 2 history along the way. But strip that all away and it is the character of Slim Parsons that will keep readers hooked. And while this may not be the latest book in a series, hopefully it is the start of a new one.

Henry Porter has written another exceptional book! He is a truly gifted storyteller who immediately captivates the reader.

Meet Alice "Slim" Parsons. A fourth-generation spy and a woman to be reckoned with! She is one of MI5's most skilled undercover agents, having recently made a daring escape from a previous assignment. After a period of inactivity, the agency now requires her expertise to infiltrate a company called Middle Kingdom, posing as a journalist to investigate the acquisition of sensitive government information. Adding to her challenges, her mother is gravely ill, she continues to search for her long-lost brother, and her life is in danger. It's all just another day at the office for Slim!

The characters are richly developed, and the narrative masterfully incorporates a wide range of complex themes—including human trafficking, modern slavery, artificial intelligence, archaeology, and grief—into a compelling story.

It is a very brave person who will cast Henry Porter as the heir to John le Carre because this book doesn’t even come close. After saying that, this story was full of action, interesting well developed characters; oh and needless plot lines. At the start of the book I was thinking that perhaps this is book 2 and I have missed book 1 but when I realised that I hadn’t and the storyline gives numerous plots I did feel that maybe it should have been a series instead of one overlong novel.

Would I recommend this book? A definite no if you are a John le Carre fan but maybe yes if you are a fan of Anthony Horowitz.

I was fortunate to receive this novel as an ARC from Netgalley.

I received a copy of this novel from the publisher via NetGalley.

MI5 agent Slim has been keeping her head down looking after her alcoholic mother for a few months after an undercover operation went wrong and she ended up saving herself by attacking/neutralizing her target, oligarch Ivan Guest, and hijacking the private plane they were in. Now she is summoned to work and asked to infiltrate a news organization called Middle Kingdom which has somehow accessed government data to reveal waste and misspending.

This was long and convoluted, but I think I kept up with the plot. Slim was a likeable and resourceful heroine with realistic family complications and loyal friends. I would read more in this series if it becomes one.

When her personal life starts to unravel, a spy discovers that everything in her life is more connected than she realised.

Slim Parson is not your usual sexy spy that gathers information by seducing man with her looks. Slim is someone that gets things done by shear determination and never considering what would happen if she fails. However, she is in a bad spot both from her personal and professional life and has to get out of hiding to face the consequences of her actions.

While not being the first thing that comes to mind when anyone reads a book, what I enjoyed the most was the plot structure. Usually you have a small plot and a big plot and both end somewhat at the end with some sort of plot twist around the 80-90% mark. The Enigma Girl is nothing like this. It has a small plot that finishes around half way of the book and the bigger plot ends at the end, which gave me a feeling that I got two stories in one. It made me enjoy the plot lines much more and not feel like a standard cliche spy novel book. Yes, there are some cliches and expected plots here and there, but the structure and way of writing provided a refreshing twist and really pleasant reading experience.

Another pleasant surprise was that the book has a lot of heart besides action. There are a lot of fast-paced action sequences as expected of any spy novel but it also has a lot of deeply personal relationships, in particular between Slim and her mom/brother. I was not expecting a spy novel to make me a bit emotional but it did.

The one thing I didn't like was the title. In my opinion the connection to Enigma was not that present to guarantee name the book after it. Yes, Bletchley Park is there and there are some connections with enigma but they are small compared to the storyline.

On a general basis I don't like comparing authors but in this case I understand and to some extent agree with the references to Liesbeth Salander (The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo) and Mick Herron (Slow Horses). If you enjoyed the latter there is a high chance that you will also enjoy The Enigma Girl. Trigger warnings include violence, murder, death of a parent, rape, and sexual trafficking.

I really enjoyed the book and would recommend it to spy novel fans and anyone looking to read a book about a strong female main character. Thank you NetGalley and Grove Atlantic for the ARC in exchange of my honest review. The Enigma Girl will be published January 28th 2025. #TheEnigmaGirl #NetGalley

For The Enigma Girl, Henry Porter has deserted his regular central character of recent novels, Paul Samson, for a new protagonist in the form of MI5 operative Slim Parsons. The book opens with Slim recovering from burnout and dealing with a raft of personal issues. Her last deep cover job for MI5 ended with a life-and-death struggle on a private jet that caused her to go on the run from both the deadly target and her angry bosses in the Security Service. They say that violence comes too easily to her and that she is potentially too unstable for the role of an MI5 operative. Despite this, Slim is recalled and asked to infiltrate a news website that is causing alarm in the highest circles. It is staffed by a group descended from wartime codebreakers operating from an unassuming office block near Bletchley Park, who seem to have dangerous access to government secrets.

The operation looks like a demotion, but Slim accepts it on the condition that the Security Service searches for her missing brother. The mission, however, turns out to be more complex than she expected. Soon Slim is having to deal with threats from her last mission, human traffickers, bosses who seem to be playing their own nefarious game and the pending death of her mother, who has her own secrets.

This is a first class spy thriller. Porter adroitly mixes the personal and the professional, and develops Slim into a character of real substance, who changes over the course of the book. The pacing is a little slow at times, but is helped along by several flashes of exciting violence and a deep sense of menace that permeates the book from the opening pages. Porter also ably conveys the bureaucratic wheeling and dealing that drives the book, and the dodgy nexus between the intelligence services, politics and the intrusion of corrupt business interests. There is also plenty of interesting information about Bletchley Park and intelligence operations during World War II and after.

Adding to the pleasure, the area around Bletchley Park is nicely evoked, including the canal on which Slim is living, and there is a good dose of fascinating archaeological detail.

On the negative side, the book is probably a bit too long and lacks the driving focal point that made Porter’s best novels, Firefly and White Hot Silence, so good. Instead of a single overarching mission around which other things develop there is a mix of different subplots and dangers this time around, which take some time to come together. The ending, though, is very tense and delivers some good thrills. These concerns, however, are only minor and do not stop The Enigma Girl from being one of the best spy novels that I have read this year. It is also one that raises some important issues about secrecy and government accountability. Highly recommended.

The Enigma Girl by Henry Porter is British espionage literature at its finest. Porter has written 8 thrillers in the subgenre of spy fiction – he was nominated for the Barry Award for Best Thriller in 2020 for White Hot Silence (Paul Samson series) and won the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger for Brandenburg Gate in 2005 (Robert Harland series). All six novels in the two series are outstanding thrillers.
This outing is a stand-alone about a female MI5 agent who has just returned from deep cover and is still being pursued by the criminal target, even when back in England where her mother is ill and her brother is missing. Or is he?
Perhaps violence comes too easily to our heroine? So her Security Service bosses say – and yet they still place her in yet another local cover as a journalist with a news website. With many similarities to Lisbeth Salander (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo), our heroine, Slim Parsons, soon begins to see connections between her Secret Service bosses, the news website, the deep cover criminals and her personal life. Danger from all four sources puts Slim into hiding from everyone!
The Enigma Girl is perfect in its spy craft and the reader’s affection for Slim develops easily as she manipulates almost everyone in her life to survive. Porter has given us another wonderful espionage novel with strong characters and intricate plot lines. How Slim stays under the radar is nothing short of brilliant. I want more of this character and hope Porter decides this is not to be a stand-alone after all.
This ARC title was provided by Netgalley.com at no cost, and I am providing an unbiased review. The Enigma Girl will be published on Jan. 28, 2025.

“Enigma Girl” by Henry Porter is a British spy thriller with a very fascinating and fierce female protagonist. She is a gifted field operative who was recently burned and now has the reputation of being overly violent. She is unexpectedly called back into service to do an undercover investigation into a news website that has published articles contained in a high security government database. While her new colleagues become suspicious of her, she finds an unexplained connection between her employer and the famous and revered Bletchley Park Codebreakers. This book has a slow start, but once into the story it is intriguing with fun characters and a terrific dog who I hope moves on to a second book..

Thank you NetGalley and Grove Atlantic for the ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.

This is a pretty good spy novel. The publisher’s blurb says for fans of John le Carré, Mick Herron, etc. Well, not really. It is good, but not quite that good 😊

Slim Parsons is a deep cover agent for MI5. Or she was until she manages to escape from a deadly situation and goes into hiding. She is given an opportunity to redeem herself, perhaps, by infiltrating a news organization that has secrets that the British ruling classes (and MI5 itself) do not want revealed. In exchange, she wants the Security Services to search for her missing brother.

There are lots of moving parts and some absolutely magnificent characters in this novel, and it is great fun trying to keep up with it all.

I enjoyed reading this book once I could get into it. I struggled in the beginning because it was a slow starting kind of book. Once you do get past that, it is a really good read including spy craft. The plot of the book was excellent, and the characters were interesting. I would recommend this book to those that love the spy craft genre. Thank you Net Galley ARC.

Thanks for the ARC!! This was a fun read, and hard to put down. There were times where it got a little meandering, like the number of characters focused on in both the government offices and the newspaper offices. The bad guys were good bad guys, and it was certainly easy to root for them to get caught. I think for a book that is ultimately about spies, i wish she had been a little better at spy craft. Throughout the book she ultimately keeps doing the same thing, which is putting herself into dangerous situations, where it looks like she's done, and then she gets rescued. I would have liked to have seen her grow a bit through the book, and maybe by the last adventure have a better plan. But Slim is a fun character, and if she goes on more adventures, I look forward to reading them.

This books starts off a little slowly but once it hooks you, you’re in for good
Featuring a superbly considered and fierce female central protagonist who is both a gifted field operative, stunning strategist and lefty rebel this modern spy thriller is absolutely worth a read. The plot is superbly drawn, as are the characters. A lot of Cold War/ sly thrillers have fairly poorly drawn interpersonal relationships- this book draws them very finely indeed. A superb read

What passes for spy fiction among American writers is mostly rock-'em-sock-'em action. A lone man, who is usually pals with the president for some reason, overcomes impossible obstacles using his incredible physical skills to achieve some significant end and save the world. Think Vince Flynn, Jack Carr, or Brad Thor.

Brit spy fiction, on the other hand, is fundamentally different from American spy fiction. Brit spy fiction is more often thoughtful, even a little meandering. There's a lot of uncertainty, even some old-fashioned confusion and indecision. Seldom are plot points unraveled with sheer physical force. Sometimes they're not unraveled at all.

Dare I say it? Brit spy fiction is smarter and more cerebral than American spy fiction. And there is no more skilled practitioner of Brit spy fiction than Henry Porter. If you're a smart reader, ENIGMA GIRL is a terrific book. If you're not, better you stick to Vince Flynn.

Slim Parsons is all but burned. When her last deep-cover job for MI5 ended with a life-and-death struggle on a private jet, she went on the run from her deadly target, a conniving businessman and money launderer codenamed “Hagfish." Now she's back at home, in hiding from her angry bosses in the Security Service, who have accused her of being overly violent and unsuitable for the role of an MI5 operative! Great read!! This book has a bit of everything! It had great suspense, intriguing, action packed, murder, mystery, a great who done it and some wild twists and turns! The story was very interesting but also a bit out there?! I definitely recommend reading this book! Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for sharing this book with me!