A Foreign Country and over 1.5 million other books are available for Amazon Kindle . Learn more

Buy New

or
Sign in to turn on 1-Click ordering.
Buy Used
Used - Good See details
Price: £4.41

or
Sign in to turn on 1-Click ordering.
 
   
Trade in Yours
For a £2.40 Gift Card
Trade in
More Buying Choices
Have one to sell? Sell yours here
Sorry, this item is not available in
Image not available for
Colour:
Image not available

 
Start reading A Foreign Country on your Kindle in under a minute.

Don't have a Kindle? Get your Kindle here, or download a FREE Kindle Reading App.

A Foreign Country [Hardcover]

Charles Cumming
4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (78 customer reviews)
RRP: £12.99
Price: £9.09 & this item Delivered FREE in the UK with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions
You Save: £3.90 (30%)
o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o
Only 12 left in stock (more on the way).
Dispatched from and sold by Amazon. Gift-wrap available.
Want delivery by Thursday, 23 May? Choose Express delivery at checkout. See Details

Formats

Amazon Price New from Used from
Kindle Edition £1.85  
Hardcover £9.09  
Paperback £1.95  
Audio, CD, Audiobook £28.67  
Audio Download, Unabridged £10.49 or Free with Audible.co.uk 30-day free trial
Amazon.co.uk Trade-In Store
Did you know you can trade in your old books for an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card to spend on the things you want? Visit the Books Trade-In Store for more details. Learn more.

Book Description

29 Mar 2012

Winner of the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger 2012 for Best Thriller of the Year. Selected by Sunday Times Books of the Year and The Guardian as Best Thriller of the Year. Perfect for fans of John le Carré, a gripping and suspenseful spy thriller from ‘the master of the modern spy thriller’ (Mail on Sunday)

Six weeks before she is due to take up her position as the first female head of MI6, Amelia Levene vanishes without a trace.

Her disappearance is the gravest crisis MI6 has faced for more than a decade. There has been no ransom demand, no word from foreign intelligence services, no hint of a defection.

Should news of Levene’s disappearance leak out, the consequences would be catastrophic. But for disgraced MI6 officer Thomas Kell, the crisis offers a chance for redemption. He is approached by his former employers and ordered to find her.

Kell’s search takes him first to France, then North Africa, where he discovers an extraordinary secret hidden deep in Levene’s past. it is a secret that could fatally compromise Britain’s national security - and for which Kell could pay with his life.

This is another first-rate intelligent thriller which will cement Cumming's reputation as one of the most engaging British novelists writing today.


Frequently Bought Together

A Foreign Country + The Spanish Game (Alec Milius 2) + A Spy by Nature (Alec Milius 1)
Price For All Three: £20.67

Buy the selected items together

Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought


Product details

  • Hardcover: 400 pages
  • Publisher: HarperCollins (29 Mar 2012)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0007337868
  • ISBN-13: 978-0007337866
  • Product Dimensions: 24.2 x 16.4 x 4.2 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (78 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 105,506 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, and more.

Product Description

Review

‘We are in Smiley country, but with extra 21st century nuance … Cumming has an exquisite touch and we should treasure him’ Daily Mail

‘A thriller that has everything you could ask for – a twisty, sexy plot, topical themes, memorable characters and plentiful spy lore’ Sunday Times, Books of the Year

‘Refreshing, plausible and effective … Best of all is the sheer pace of the narrative’ Spectator

‘You are likely to be up for most of the night to find out how this novel ends. It grips from the first page … A fast-moving treat’ The Scotsman

Praise for Charles Cumming:

‘Charles Cumming is a man put on this earth to perpetuate the spy thriller’ Daily Telegraph

‘From the first page to the last it has the ring of absolute authenticity. Tautly written, cleverly plotted…it reminded me strongly of the early books of John le Carré’ Robert Harris

About the Author

Charles Cumming was born in Scotland in 1971. He was educated at Eton and graduated from the University of Edinburgh in 1994 with First Class Honours in English Literature. In the summer of 1995, Charles was approached for recruitment by the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6). A year later he moved to Montreal where he began working on a novel based on his experiences with MI6. A Spy By Nature was published in the UK in 2001. This is his sixth novel.


Inside This Book (Learn More)
Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
Search inside this book:

What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?


Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews
48 of 51 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars A Foreign Country -Excellent spy thriller 9 April 2012
By Champollion VINE™ VOICE
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)
Spy fiction has an impressive list of luminaries, John Buchan, Erskine Childers, Len Deighton, John Le Carre and so on to which I feel you can add, Charles Cumming.

Tom Kell is an MI6 agent who has left the department under a cloud and finding life tedious, outside the service, is enticed back to working for the department.

The task he is given is no ordinary one. The new head of MI6 Amelia Levene has gone missing and he must investigate and find her. There are lots of twists and surprises along the way and nothing is quite as it seems.

"A Foreign Country" is a supremely structured story, impressively written, with sharp dialogue and an authentic, gripping plot-line, which I found to be a page turner. It is an engaging tale with credible characters and one which will hold your attention from the first page to the last.

Will this be the last story involving British agent Tom Kell? There is scope for more and it would be well worth another run. This book may not have the complex, analytical depth of Le Carre, but it is an entertaining read.

If spy thrillers are to your taste, then look no further, this is top drawer. Recommended.
Comment | 
Was this review helpful to you?
19 of 20 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars Very good.....but not excellent 1 April 2012
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
I have read all of Charles Cummings' novels and he is a fine writer. His latest - A Foreign Country - is another really top notch read. The comparison to John Le Carre is, I think, wrong. Cummings' books develop into the fast paced thriller and he is one of the best writers who do this. But he does not have the literary style, depth and sophistication of Le Carre - what another reviewer complained of as 'over indulgent and boring'. My only complaint about this book is that the ending was too predictable. But the 'fundamental idea' of the book was brilliant - but it would have needed John Le Carre to have really exposed the complete ruthlessness that must lie at the heart of any country's Secret Service.
Was this review helpful to you?
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars Enjoyable Summer Espionage Yarn 16 Aug 2012
By F. S. L'hoir TOP 500 REVIEWER VINE™ VOICE
Format:Kindle Edition
Charles Cumming's compact chapters whiz by at a breakneck pace, as he moves his reader between France and Tunisia and back to England in this spy novel, which focuses on the sudden disappearance of the woman who has been newly appointed as head of the Secret Intelligence Service. The central character, Thomas Kell, is engaging, as is Amelia Levene, the SIS chief, as long as she is missing. I felt that she was 'found' a bit too soon in the book. (The name of the protagonist seems to be an homage to Vernon Kell, the first director-general of MI5, and one wonders if Mr Cumming himself is connected to Mansfield Cumming, the first director of MI6.).

The author's skilled narrative technique kept me glued to the book, but I began to feel slightly let down towards the end. It was as if what began as a an unusually taut tale of intrigue, had taken a sudden plunge into the pool of conventionality with cryptonyms and other clichés of the trade craft of espionage.

By the end I was also wondering about the author's choice of title, which somehow no longer seemed to fit the book. At a guess, I would say that the foreign country of the title is espionage itself, which has its own laws that are totally alien to outsiders, but such an interpretation is not at all evident from the narrative.

Nevertheless, 'A Foreign Country' constitutes an entertaining summer read for those who are addicted to spy fiction.

Reviewed for Vine; Amazon.com
Comment | 
Was this review helpful to you?
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?   Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars well spun yarn
Decent book of its ilk, good read if you like spy stories. Pretty well written and kept you wanting more. Had some good twists!
Published 2 days ago by Mr. Anthony Collier
4.0 out of 5 stars Unconventional Spy Story-telling
I enjoyed it. I tried to predict, but didn't succeed. It's not the usual spy story-telling kind of novel. Read more
Published 5 days ago by Clement Eke
4.0 out of 5 stars More Freddie Forsyth than John Le Carre
This is the first book I've read by Charles Cumming, and very enjoyable it was too. But it does rather prove that many professional reviewers don't seem to know what they're on... Read more
Published 7 days ago by Jl Adcock
3.0 out of 5 stars Not bad but lacking tension
My first Cummings and it hasn't put me off. It is not Le Carre, or even Deighton territory but at least hero Kell is believable. Read more
Published 14 days ago by Huck Flynn
5.0 out of 5 stars Great spy thriller
This is a fine, enthralling spy story about UK special intelligence services, lost loves and potential future loves. Read more
Published 15 days ago by Blogpiper
4.0 out of 5 stars A cut above
How refreshing to not have to read a spy thriller where the main player is not a kick ass indestructable ninja with a degree in nuclear physics who performs brain surgery as a... Read more
Published 16 days ago by Steveatki
4.0 out of 5 stars Refreshing new anti hero.
Nothing too flashy about Tom Kell. He's much about a real spook as I would imagine. He wouldn't dare jump off a speeding train or defuse an atom bomb. Read more
Published 16 days ago by CEEAITCHJAY
4.0 out of 5 stars Slow at the beginning but fine at the end.
I wanted to read a good spy novel that is not your general adventure packed nonsense about saving the world from post-soviet warlords. Read more
Published 17 days ago by Balazs Goldschmidt
3.0 out of 5 stars Quick easy read
Saw this book in Tesco for £1.95 and read the back cover, recommendations and the first page and thought it would be a good 24 hour read. It proved to be just that. Read more
Published 19 days ago by Alexander Kreator
5.0 out of 5 stars A very good read
This is an excellent book, in every detail. It is much more believable than most books about spies. The whole story from beginning to end is gripping. Read more
Published 21 days ago by Mr. R. E. Disney
Search Customer Reviews
Only search this product's reviews

Customer Discussions

This product's forum
Discussion Replies Latest Post
No discussions yet

Ask questions, Share opinions, Gain insight
Start a new discussion
Topic:
First post:
Prompts for sign-in
 


Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
Search all Amazon discussions
   
Related forums


Listmania!


Look for similar items by category


Feedback


Amazon.co.uk Privacy Statement Amazon.co.uk Delivery Information Amazon.co.uk Returns & Exchanges