Book review: An extraordinary insight into those living a life of duality in the Troubles

Willie Carlin, Freddie Scappaticci, and other less well-documented informers – and what they did from 1980 through to the peace process – are examined here. Most interestingly, Edwards asks why they would do it. 

In the back of an old army vehicle on a visit back to Northern Ireland, former Provo informer Willie Carlin (55), (right) with another "Spook" who uses the pseudonym Kevin Fulton.

• Agents of Influence: Britain’s Secret Intelligence War Against the IRA
• Aaron Edwards 
• Merrion Press pb, €19.95