The Irregular: The utterly gripping new instalment in the Jonas Merrick series from the master of the spy thriller
By (Author) Gerald Seymour
Hodder & Stoughton
Hodder & Stoughton
13th January 2026
United Kingdom
General
Fiction
Thriller / suspense fiction
Espionage and spy thriller
Paperback
416
Width 153mm, Height 234mm
The Metropolitan Police have an unsolvable problem: 'Lachy' Wilson is a ruthless and obscenely rich British drugs lord who has bought off dozens of their officers. Thanks to these informants, no one can lay a glove on Wilson and he is considered 'untouchable'.
Wilson is dreaming of one last, game-changing shipment of heroin into the UK. The Met turn to the outside for help. Jonas Merrick is an MI5 officer, unspectacular in his own right but spectacular in the success he's had in dangerous counter terrorist operations. Can he thwart the drugs plot Jonas has an ace in the hole: Kenny 'Chopper' Harris is an ex-paratrooper and soon to be ex-member of the Flying Squad, looking for a new home, new loyalties. Jonas recruits him to get close to Wilson's Achilles's heel: Julie Wilson is the heir apparent to the family drugs empire and Lachy's go-between. Julie, like Chopper, is a lost soul - she dreams of life outside her father's brutal orbit. Her fate is about to change at their first meeting. A bond is formed, a resolution is made: Chopper will get her free of her family, if she'll betray her mission. Soon their desperate game of deception begins - a game which will inevitably end in a bloody denouement.PRAISE FOR GERALD SEYMOUR
Gerald Seymour has created the most memorable hero of his long career * The Times *
You don't read Gerald Seymour, you commit to it totally. His stories have amazing detail, yet you still fly through them * Sun *
There are strong echoes of George Smiley in Merrick's mild and unprepossessing manner, which disguises a razor-sharp brain and considerable courage when necessary * Financial Times *
Seymour's finger is always on the current socio-political pulse * i News *
[Charles] Cumming is perhaps matched only by Gerald Seymour now when it comes to recounting field operations * Sunday Times *
[Seymour] has lost none of his talent for thrilling plots and creating credible and sympathetic characters, nor his journalist's eye for modern espionage tradecraft and techniques * Shots Magazine *
Supreme spy writer * Peterborough Telegraph *
Gerald Seymour exploded onto the literary scene in 1975 with the massive bestseller HARRY'S GAME. The first major thriller to tackle the modern troubles in Northern Ireland, it was described by Frederick Forsyth as 'like nothing else I have ever read' and it changed the landscape of the British thriller forever.
Gerald Seymour was a reporter at ITN for fifteen years. He covered events in Vietnam, Borneo, Aden, the Munich Olympics, Israel and Northern Ireland. He has been a full-time writer since 1978.