Books like The coincidence engine by Sam Leith

In Sam Leith’s playful thriller, a Gulf‑coast hurricane transforms a back‑country Alabama town into a craft workshop built from bean‑cans and junkyard scrap. Meanwhile, an eccentric mathematician disappears in the French Pyrenees, and a multinational arms conglomerate’s operatives zero in on Alex Smart, a Cambridge postgraduate who has just proposed to his American girlfriend. The Directorate of the Extremely Improbable—a covert agency whose very existence is questioned—detects unusual activity. Its operative, Red Queen, takes a keen interest in Alex and the case. What follows is a chaotic, high‑speed chase across an imagined America, weaving through madness, murder, mistaken identity, and a cascade of unhealthy yet delicious snacks as the mysterious Coincidence Engine begins to work. Leith blends sharp humor with speculative intrigue, exploring how improbable events can emerge when personal desires, espionage, and science collide.

First publish date: 2011