# The Rook

By Daniel O'Malley · Checquy, book 1

Profile: https://hahafiction.com/books/the-rook-bc97c919/

Myfanwy Thomas wakes in a London park surrounded by bodies and can’t remember who she is. Letters from her former self help her work out what to do next. It turns out she’s a senior operative in the Checquy, which handles supernatural threats, and whoever wants her dead may already work there.

## What makes it funny?

The woman who wrote the letters knows enough to warn Myfanwy about waking up in the rain among dead people. She takes care to explain that she can’t actually see the future. If she could, there’d be a more immediate use for it: picking the winning lottery numbers.

### The comedy at work

The letters let Myfanwy’s old self be matter-of-fact about problems her new self barely knows how to name. She has a job to get back to while she’s still learning what counts as ordinary at an agency where one person can have four bodies.

### Try this if…

Read this for an espionage plot that keeps its mole hunt while expanding what a colleague might be capable of. The supernatural details are stranger than the jobs people do with them.

## What to expect

- Genre: Crime & thriller · Fantasy
- On the shelf: Spy & espionage · Urban fantasy
- Kind of humor: Dry wit
- Format: Novel

## Sources & further reading

- Reading sample: [Daniel O’Malley: sample chapters](https://www.rookfiles.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/The-Rook_chapters-1-2.pdf)
- Publisher: [Orion: book catalog and series order](https://www.hachette.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/Orion-Catalogue-Jan-Jul-2025-WEB-1.pdf)
- Publisher: [Little, Brown: book description and trade paperback](https://www.hbgacademic.com/titles/daniel-omalley/the-rook/9780316098809)