Random Jottings

Recent reading

I have had problems with the blog the last week or so as my host, Typepad, who I have been with for years, had a new update etc etc and like all updates it caused mayhem and the blog was unavailable. An irritant for me, but checking on Twitter I could see how upset so many users were who were running businesses and were losing customers and orders.

Well they finally got it sorted and my post on Magpie Murders finally was able to be logged on.  SInce posting I have finished Moonlight Murders, a follow up to Magpie, and enjoyed its complexity and fun very much.  I am not sure if there will be another in this series, I do hope so.

I have also re-read the Karen Pirie books by Val Macdermid. I have read all her output and this particular series is my favourite.  I revisited them as I knew there was a tv adaptation coming up of A Distant Echo and I wanted to refresh my memory.  The TV dramatisation was a huge hit with large ratings and I gather another is in the pipeline.  I did not care for the actress who played the title role very much and I thought she was totally unlike the Karen of the books, but I put that to one side a she was very good indeed.   There were minor irritants with the characters, gender changed for one main protagonist for no reasont that I could understand, and the ethnicity of others was changed, presumably to tick diversity boxes as it made no difference to the story at all. I do find this virtue signalling that casting directors go in for rather boring and wish they would not do it but hey ho.   By the last episode it did not really matter as the tension was racheted up and it really had me gripped.   Do catch it if you can. Also if you read the books then please do read them in order.

I then turned to Marple: twelve new stories featuring the famous Christie creation. Twelve writers producing "new" Miss Marple tales.  This really irritates me as it is totally unneccessary and the main reason for this exercise is Money using the Christie name. 

I found most of them heavy going and nearly all lacking the  gentle wit and Marple touch. Oddly enough the only one which rang true in any way was the story penned by Val Macdermid. She got it right. The rest did not.  But it is out in time for Christmas and that is the obvious reason.

I have already written about the Alan Rickman diaries which I found disappointing and revealed a tormented, self absorbed persona in one of my favourite actors. Why they were ever published is beyond me. They were clearly personal and not written with publication in mind. I presume the reason is, once again, money.

As an antidote to this I turned to Patricia Wentworth. I have read all the Miss Silver cases and loved them but the author wrote many other crime stories and Dean Street Press (one of my very favourite publishers) have reprinted many more of these. I read three in one day (well it was raining and my arthritis was playing up so it was a day on the bed with hot water bottles) and they were huge fun. Madly dramatic and a bit over the top but thoroughly enjoyable. I read The Amazing Chance, Dead or Alive and the Red Lacquer Case and gave myself over to sheer in fun.

Left you Dead by Peter James.  I read this mainly because I have waded through all the Inspector Grace books but they really had become rather tedious and on at least a couple of occasions when it seems to me he had no idea what to do with a character he just killed them off. He did it again in this book.  I really enjoyed them when I started and I do wonder why authors carry on when they are clearly tired of churning them out. There was an interview with Lee Child in the paper today and he said that is why he stopped writing the Reacher books. 

Sadly though there will be no more Grace books because when I was writing this post I discovered that the author had died.  He was hugely successful and enjoyed by many including me though, as I said, I had rather lost interest in them.

Another of my favourite authors, Andrea Camilleri, died last year and he left several books behind for publication after his death. He was in his late eighties when he passed and the last few books showed a lack of focus which is understandable.   The final Montalbano book, Riccardino, was, I am sorry to say, really poor.   I have loved the Montalbano books with Catarella and Fabrizio and they have given me hours of enjoyment and many laugh out moments.

I mentioned in an earlier post the novels of Susan Scarlett AKA Noel Streatfield which I simply wallowed in, no other word, and they come once more from the Wonderful Dean Street Press. Well I read a couple more and have one left and am saving it up for a treat. Does that make sense?   Do check them out.

And finally, after a rather disappointing run, I turned to Agatha Christie.  I have recently rewatched the superb Miss Marple series on the TV and I re-read Murder at the Vicarage, Moving Finger, a Pocketful of Rye and A Murder is Announced and loved them all over again. I think Christie was a superb writer with a deftness of touch as well as steel and also she was funny,

There is one line in the TV version of A Murder is Announced which is pure Christie but I cannot find it in the book, so assume the script writer came up with this gem.  Miss Marple is having tea with Dora, and they are discussing a young man on the list of suspects.

"you know he is a communist don't you Miss Marple?"

"Oh dear, he must be very lonely in Chipping Cleghorn"

Priceless.

A Plethora of Detectives (1)

Plethora. Lovely word, rolls off the tongue. I gather it means a large or excessive amount of something and I have certainly been reading loads of detective stories in the last week or so.  Mixed enjoyment. Some irritation. So here are my thoughts.

First up the latest Inspector Banks novel by Peter Robinson When the Music's Over (please note this is not published until July); I have read all of the Inspector Banks books and, on the whole, find them interesting, well plotted and well written. BUT, and this is a big but, the author will insist on telling us what music Banks is listening to and going into great details about the groups and the singers, to the point of tedium. OK we get it that Peter Robinson likes this stuff and wants us to know but I think we have got the message by now. It has got worse over the last three books and now detracts from what is nearly always a good story. I am surprised that his editor (if he has one) , has not come down hard on this. I would.

A few years ago a writer whose detective I used to follow wrote a book which was clearly based on the James Bulgar case and dwelt on it to the point of being distasteful. I thought it was ill judged and amazed that the publishers allowed it through. When the Music's Over latches onto Operation Yewtree and in the course of verisimilitude names all those involved, what the police have to do to make sure the public don't think they have got it wrong, mistakes made in the past etc etc. Banks has been asked to investigate a case of historic abuse, and at this stage I wondered whether to bother carrying on, but I did. The famous name in the story is clearly based on Stuart Hall even down to his physical characteristics and appearance and I found this usage of a recent case left a nasty taste in my mouth. We also have a case running alongside this which involved a gang of Pakistanis grooming underage girls, again taken from life and again, I was not happy with this at all.

The book reads like a Robinson polemic on Islamophobia, racism and immigration and it seems to me that Inspector Banks has now been hijacked by political correctness and wants to give us, the readers, a lecture. I was not happy with this at all, and yet finished reading it as there is an excellent story in here, with interesting characters and good solid police work. I just wish the author would stick to telling stories and not give us his views on the previously mentioned topics. I can read all about that in the papers.

Love you Dead - Peter James. This is the latest Detective Grace story which are all based in Brighton and my original reason for starting this series as it is a town I love and have happy childhood memories of my holidays there.  I enjoy these books very much though every now and then in the middle of the narrative there is suddenly a chunk of really clunky writing. Never lasts very long and is usually when he is chatting to his mate Branson. Then it vanishes and we pick up again. Happens again this time. I daresay I am the only one who has spotted it or even thought it so fee free to ignore me. (Published 19 May 2016)

This is a great story and really exciting with twists and turns all over the place.  We start with the mysterious death of an elderly financier who happens to be engaged to a very young fiance, Jodie, who seems fairly untroubled by his demise. They are out skiing and he disappears down a slope never to be seen again.  While recovering from her sorrow she has a one night stand with a Russian who she meets in a bar in New York and clocks him over the head when he gets a bit rough. Before she leaves his room she has a quick look around and finds a bag stuffed with cash and a memory stick hidden away. Silly woman decides to take it with her not realising that she will likely end up with the Russian mafia on her trail. She hies it back to Brighton where she is to meet her next husband/victim and off they go on a cruise and, of course, soon meets his death.

Running alongside this investigation we have the follow up and, at long last, resolution of the mystery of Sandy Grace's disappearance which has run through all the books. Very grateful for this as I felt it was getting really annoying and a plot device that had outlived its usefulness. And it ends with a twist in this saga that anybody who has read all of these books (ME!) could see coming a mile off and lines us up nicely for the next one.

Great read and I sat and read it in one sitting.

OK have another two to go but will write about those tomorrow as I gather my thoughts on same.  I have also recently received a heap of Crime Classics from the British Library so many more detectives to come. I am beginning to think I should rename my blog Random Teccery (a phrase used by the wonderful Ngaio Marsh) but will refrain.....

Au reservoir.

Triple Tecs

I don't know about you but in the summer I don't cook much, nor do I read What I Call serious reading. Too hot to cook, well sometimes, and also difficult to concentrate when the sun is shining. I like something light to eat and steak and kidney pie loses its savour. Ditto books.  Not saying that when the nights are cold I am suddenly going to work my way through the Booker list or start reading Gogol but I do tend to hunker down with books that need concentration.

And looking at my reading over the last few weeks I have been reading loads of detective stories. Re-reading the Zouroudi books set in Greece which I love and then in the last week have had three of my favourite detective series come up with the latest.

Linda Castillo-The Dead will Tell. The latest in the series featuring Kate Burkholder, chief of police in Painters Mill in Amish country.   Love these books.  They are well written with great story lines and there has not been a dud one amongst them. If I have one criticism it is to say that for a peace loving people, the Amish do seem to have a lot of murder and mayhem going on. It stretches credulity a tad but then I think of Midsomer Murders and the body count in that series and realise that nothing reaches the level of death and destruction there.

OK so everyone in Painters Mill knows the abandoned Hochstetler farm is haunted. A terrible murder and fire took place there over thirty years ago and when Kate Burkholder is called to the scene of an apparent suicide of an old man found hanging from the rafters in his dilapidated barn she realises that his death is a murder and a murder done particularly cruelly with the maximum amount of suffering. When a second man is found dead, also seemingly by his own hand, Kate discovers that, in common with the first murder, there is a link to the old case.  And there seem to be more on the killer's list....

If you have yet to discover this series then I really recommend them. But do read them in order as there is a narrative thread dealing with Kate's personal life that runs through them all.

Want you Dead - Peter James. The latest in the Roy Grace series set in Brighton.

Single girl, 29, smouldering redhead, love life that's crashed and burned. Seeks new flame to rekindle her fire. Fun, friendship and – who knows – maybe more?

An ad placed on a dating website leads Red Westwood to meet charming and rich Bryce Laurent. He is handsome and madly in love with her, showering her with gifts and presents. When his past and his lies are revealed to her she breaks up with him and evicts him from her flat.  But he is obsessed with her and he intends to destroy her, her life and her family. There seems to be no escape.

Roy Grace finds that Bryce Laurent is cunning and ruthless with a string of aliases and difficult to find. While he is dealing with this case he is also arranging his marriage to Cleo and having nightmares that his missing wife Sandy will turn up at his wedding and ruin his future.   

There have been a few adverse reviews regarding this latest Grace book so I was not sure what to expect when I started it but found I became totally immersed and engaged, reading it straight through in one sitting.   If I do have a criticism it is that a car accident removed an unpleasant character in the last book and the same happens in this one.   Very helpful but it certainly opens up a new story line which will no doubt be explored in the next one in the series.  I look forward to it.

Abbatoir Blues - Peter Robinson. The latest DCI Banks book and the first thing you have to remember when reading these is that the TV series has gone off on a totally different tack, the characterisation of Banks is also different and you have to put this out your mind, else you will get very muddled as to who does what and what is happening.

I found the last Banks book, The Children of the Revolution, very tedious and rather boring and pleased that this one is back to form. Initially investigating the theft of an extremely expensive tractor, the latest in a long line of rural crimes, it soon escalates when human blood is discovered in an abandoned hangar and it is clear a murder has taken place. Then a possible witness vanishes and goes on the run and it all starts to get very complicated.

There is one common factor in these books that really irritates after a while. The constant harping on about what music Banks is listening to, or any other character, given in detail. If someone is driving along and about to meet his death I am really not interested in knowing whether he is into rap or garage music, I really am not.  And when Banks gets home and finds a CD in the post I don't really need to know it is a recording of lieder by Janet Baker.   Peter Robinson does go on at length about this and I do wish somebody at his publishers would tell him to tone it down a bit.

But, apart from that, a return to form.

So three good tecs this week and I have a few more on the pile waiting to go....

Serial Detectives

I do love discovering new detectives, well new to me at any rate, particularly when there is a whole series to keep me going. Over the lifetime of this blog I have indulged in quite a few and thought it would be fun to see how many I have read.

Donna Leon - Brunetti series.   These are set in Venice and when I discovered them I was hooked. First one I read was Death at la Fenice which had the glorious combination of murder and opera, irresistible. I then plunged into an orgy of Venetian mysteries and polished off the lot in a month and then had to wait each year patiently for the next one to be published.    I have found that the last two or three have lacked a certain something, not quite sure what, but I feel that the author may have begun to tire of Brunetti and Paola his intellectual wife who manages to knock up stunning lunches each day and reads Henry James for fun. I, too, have begun to tire of her and now find her perfection irritating but Brunetti continues to fascinate.

Andrea Camilleri - Inspector Montalbano.   Ah these I will never tire of. I have just read and reviewed the   fourteenth in the series over on Shiny New Books here so do have a read.  The characters in these books are so endearing and funny and full of human frailty and the gem in the middle is Catarella, the intellectually challenged policeman who would lay down his life for the Inspector. There have been times reading these books when I have wept with laughter.  

Martin O'Brien - Daniel Jacquot. These books are set in Marseilles and simply reek of fish and Galouise and are totally atmospheric.  The hero, Daniel, is an ex-rugby player who wears his hair in a ponytail. Yes, I know but he is gorgeous and sexy. The stories are exceptionally well plotted and written and I simply love them.

Back in the UK I have enjoyed the Roy Grace books by Peter James. These are set in Brighton and part of their charm for me is knowing the streets and areas in which the stories are located. A long running series, I feel they need to be read in order so that you can follow the development of his character and the story of his personal life, which is tangled to say the least.   Nothing new there.....

P D James - Inspector Dalgliesh.  No need for recommendations from me for these simply wonderful books. Superbly written with a clarity of style which I find so satisfying to read. Dalgliesh is a fascinating character and I do wish a TV series could be made that did him justice. The originals were made back in the seventies and are a tad old hat now and the most recent with Martin Shaw, totally wooden and uncharismatic, were boring. Well I thought so, please feel free to disagree.

Susan Hill - Simon Serrailer.   The charismatic Simon lives in Lafferton and heads up the specialist crime division.  Devoted to his sister and her family he avoids commitment himself and when he finally falls in love, it is with somebody out of his reach.   HIs family life runs alongside the current investigation and it is best to read these in order so that the reader can see the time line.  Very well written and unputdownable.

And now the USA

Michael Connelly - Harry Bosch is his detective in the LAPD.  Goes without saying that he is divorced and estranged from his daughter for several of the books.   Gritty and realistic they are compulsively readable and as the author kindly writes at least one a year, all to a high standard, I don't have to wait too long for the next fix. He also writes books starring another character, Micky Haller, a downtown lawer who operates just on the right side of the law.    Both series are excellent.   A film was made of a Haller book, The Lincoln Lawyer, which follows the storyline exactly and is very good indeed.

Lee Childs - Jack Reacher.   I have recently mentioned the Jack Reacher books and nothing more to add other than they are all exactly the same, same super cool dialogue, same hero, same actions, all good fun and instantly forgettable. No need to bother reading them in order as it makes no difference at all. Fun.

I am in the throes of a re-read of the books of Anne Zouroudi. Her detective, or investigator really, is the Fat Man as he is described - his name is Hermes Diaktoris and he laughs that his father gave him this name meaning the Winged Messenger. The stories are set in the Greek islands and the atmosphere, heat, smell and feeling of the sun scorched lands is on every page.  Hermes rights wrongs and dispenses his own brand of justice, helping those in pain and sorrow and punishing those who have committed a crime. When asked where he comes from and who he is, his reply is that he is from Athens and is not with the police but with a 'higher authority'.   I leave it to the reader to come to their own conclusion.   They are excellent and I urge you to try them.

One of the charms of detective stories set abroad is the attention paid to food.  Here is a link to a post of a few years ago now which illustrates the importance of food in the Italian stories I have mentioned above:

http://randomjottings.typepad.com/random_jottings_of_an_ope/2009/01/montalbano-and-brunetti.html

The Zouroudi books are the same. No fish and chips in the police canteen here.

I love crime fiction, have done all my life and am amazed at the ingenuity and creativity of their authors. I have not mentioned Sayers or Christie, two of my most favourite authors, saving that for another day as pretty sure once I get started on them the post will go on for reams and reams. And then there is Patricia Wentworth, Georgette Heyer, Peter Robinson Inspector Banks series, and we had better not get started on Nordic crime, that too will wait for another day

I understand that Penguin are planning on republishing Simenon's Maigret books. I am ashamed to say I have read none of them so will look forward to seeing how I get on with this author. He wrote over 100 so I am hoping that I love them on first sight as they will keep me going for some time........

Dead Man's Time - Peter James

I discovered the Detective Grace series by accident. I took a book out of the library and it was not until I got home that I realised it was not PD James but Peter James. A tad annoyed but thought I would give it a go. Next day straight back to the library to get what else was there on the shelves and then onto Amazon to fill in the gaps.

This is a really excellent and well narrated series always with an exciting and thrilling ending which keeps you guessing to the last minute and this latest Dead Man's Time is no different. A vicious robbery takes place in which an elderly lady is tortured and left dying, her house stripped of valuable antiques and a watch of priceless sentimental value is taken. Her brother, a wealthy antique dealer, is not willing to allow the law to take its course but decides to search for vengeance on his own terms.

The story flits backwards and forwards between 1912 and the present day and the theft of this watch links the two. As a young boy Gavin Daly witness the brutal murder of his mother and the kidnapping of his father in New York, a victim of the rivalry between the gangs of that time. He and his sister are taken to Ireland by his aunt, but he vows that one day he will return and find his father.

The investigation takes Roy Grace and his team to New York to track down not only the killer of Gavin Daly's sister, but also to try to prevent a final act of murder whose roots lie in the events that took place all those years ago.    It is a simply stonking read, one of the author's best and when it arrived the other day I started it immediately and ended up bleary eyed at 1 am in the morning unable to go to sleep until I knew what happened.

Apart from the main crime and murder there is also a narrative thread running through all the books, touching on Grace's past and present personal life relating to the disappearance ten years ago of his wife Sandy, his fiance Cleo and their new baby son. There is also somebody who had a very nasty grudge against DS Grace who is determined to cause him harm, or Cleo or baby Noah......

I highly recommend this series but if you decide to read them, and I hope you do, then please do read them  in order and you will get more out of them if you follow the personal along with the detective persona.

A week or so ago I was invited to be involved in the launch of this book which takes place in Brighton on 22 June, but sadly am unable to make it much to my chagrin as it sounds enormous fun and I love Brighton, having spend quite a lot of my childhood holidays there.   There is to be a Peter James Secret Brighton Walk and floor stickers will be placed at key Brighton landmarks along the way.

This sounds tremendous fun and if you are interested in finding out more please go to http://www.peterjamesbrighton.com/ to download the Secret Brighton walk and visit www.panmacmillan.com/PJCodes   for further information.

If you buy this title you will find that hyour are able to enter Peter James' Brighton through a new map and unlock secret material with the Blippar smartphone app and details are given inside on how to do this. If hyou don't have a smartphone or table, don't worry, you can access it with the link above on Peter James Brighton.

Times have certainly changed, once upon a time you got a bookmark if you were lucky, now you get an app............

Random Crime Reading around the World

Now that the hassle of new laptop and setting it up etc is behind me (well almost, scanner on printer not working yet but I am ignoring it for the moment), I am finally getting down to posting about books.   I mentioned in one of my summing up posts of 2012 that I was seriously wondering whether to rename this blog to Random Crime as I seem to read such a lot of crime fiction. This genre has always fascinated me since my discovery of Dame Agatha Christie at the age of eleven when I was given a very old battered Pan edition of what we now call Ten Little Indians and spent a morning ignoring all school work but totally engrossed in wondering How on Earth this was going to end.   After that I was up and running.  

I love 1930's crimfic and Ngaio Marsh is another of my favourites. Gorgeous detective, Roderick Alleyn and I re-read all of these every year or so.   Dorothy L Sayers and Lord Peter Wimsey, well what can one say? Love love love them and only read them for the first time about ten years ago, a treat worth waiting for.

Now I read anything I can get my hands on. Enjoy most crime writers, but there have been failures.  Patricia Cornwall is far to gory for me, she goes into the forensics and anatomical detail with almost too much lip smacking enjoyment and after reading four or five, gave up.   Lisa Jackson, OK, but over written and with lots of inner musings along the line of Come on Get a Grip written in italics and all gets a bit wearying. Have tried Dean Koontz but not for me and have yet to enjoy a Sarah Paretsky book, so my hit rate is not 100%.   BUT I still have discovered a wealth of stonking good reads over the last few years and here are a few of them.

Michael Connelly - the Harry Bosch books.   I read them all out of order and we all know he is that well know character the Maverick Cop which can become tiresome after a while, but great fun and tightly plotted. Set in Los Angeles.   His other hero, Mickey Haller an LA lawyer, I find more enjoyable and the court room scenes are totally gripping and fascinating.

Linda Castillo - all her books have an Amish setting and while I am starting to doubt whether this body count can really be kept up (getting as bad as Midsomer Murders) her main protagonist, Kate Burkholder who is the chief of police in a small town, is immensely likeable. Flawed of course, that goes without saying, but immensely readable.

Tess Gerritsen - wrote a slew of romantic/crime books before she started on her Rizzoli and Isles series set in Boston.   These are much better and very well written.   TV series which I can now see on Sky, dire.

These are just a few of the US writers I have discovered recently.

So we turn to Scandinavian detective fiction which has increased enormously in popularity, mainly due to the Wallender series on BBC4.   Ignore the Ken Branagh version which, though watchable is a bit off the wall, the Swedish version so much better.  I read all the books by Mankel but sadly he has now finished with this detective and there will be no more.  The final one in the series was rather melancholy and sad.    I now realise when writing this that I have an inflated idea of just how much ScandiCrime I have read as all my other expertise in this area comes from watching The Killing Series 1-3 on TV. There has been a 'novelisation' of the first series which I found rather unreadable and hope they do not attempt the others.   Other watching was The Bridge which was pretty stunning.

Camilla Lackberg -  brilliant. Here is the link to a review of one of her books and one of Linda Castillo in the same post

http://randomjottings.typepad.com/random_jottings_of_an_ope/2009/09/icy-murder.html

I am mentioning also Jo Nesbo though I have found his most recent titles rather gory and upsetting. First one of his I read, the Snowman, gave me nightmares for weeks.   I have his latest on the shelf, but finding it difficult to get into so leaving it for a bit.

Quentin Bates has written thrillers set in Iceland which I have read and enjoyed.

http://randomjottings.typepad.com/random_jottings_of_an_ope/2011/02/frozen-out-quentin-bates.html

Now we come to Italy and oh how I love the Montalbano books by Camilleri.  They are set in Sicily and are witty and funny and have reduced me to tears of helpless laughter; they have also reduced me to tears for quite another reason.   Montalbano is a wonderful character, a man of feeling and love and I wish the author a long and happy life so he can continue producing these wonderful books,

I have waiting for me two books by Marco Vichi which are set in Florence. I read and loved the first one, which I reviewed here, and I know this may sound daft, but I am just enjoying having these on my shelves knowing they are there waiting for me.  I am saving them up as a treat, and a treat they will be that I guarantee. Set in Florence in the sixties, before computers and mobile phones, they are engagingly old fashioned in procedure and I found that charming.

Commisioner Alec Blume - set in Rome. Author is Conor Fitzgerald. May not grab you at first but persevere, they are worth reading.

Brunetti books set in Venice and written by Donna Leon. Loved them all, even if Brunetti's smart arse wife who seems to be able to discourse intelligently on Henry James while knocking up spahgetti vongole at the same time, is beginning to get really really boring. But the last one, Beastly Things, was poor and I get the feeling she is tiring of her hero.   A non Brunetti book, published just before Christmas, also pretty poor. Sad.

Then the wonderfully named, Giancarlo Carofiglio.   Superbly written and credit must go to the translater who has done a marvellous job.      Set in Puglia and Involuntary Witness one of the best thrillers I have read in ages and the court room scene totally pinned me to my seat.

Back home and in the last couple of years I have discovered the Roy Grace books of Peter James, set in Brighton, a place I know well, and they are real page turners with a running personal story line in each book which is working up to a climax. Cannot wait for next one in the series.

DCI Banks books by Peter Robinson. Another discovery by me over the last year and gosh they are good. Am now catching up on the TV series which I missed first time around; good as well and sticks to the story lines pretty closely though not sure about the characterisation of Banks.

My latest discovery is Martin O'Brien. I have not reviewed all of his books but click on his name to see a review of my first of his which sent me off in chase of all the others.   They are set in Marseilles and feature a rather gorgeous Daniel Jacquot and they are excellent and totally unputdownable.

There are so many others I have discovered over the last few years, but no room or time to mention them all otherwise I will be hear all night, but as I find new ones (and have just enjoyed a debut thriller set in Maine this week) I will be posting about them. I also realise I have not mentioned PD James, Ruth Rendell and many others but you will have to take it as read that I devoured the lot and loved them.

As a final note, I picked up a battered old Penguin edition of a Simenon Maigret book recently. I have never read any of them and as there seem to be about a hundred or so, I really feel I ought to give them a whirl.  Can I ask any of you out there if you have read them, what you think of them and recommend any titles please?

Merci beaucoup.

 

Another two Goodies

Getting through a lot of books at the moment and as I am going to be away for a few days soon thought I had better get some reviews done.

First up Dead Man's Grip by Peter James.  This is the latest Detective Grace novels set in Brighton and I only discovered these by accident last year when I brought one home thinking it was a PD James that I had somehow missed reading.   Annoyed when I found out my mistake but my annoyance quickly vanished when I started reading Dead Tomorrow and found I was totally hooked.   As I know Brighton pretty well it really adds another layer of enjoyment to know exactly where the characters are and how they get there and when the Pier is described or the fact that the ambulance is by the Clock Tower, I can think oh yes,  Sorry that is a pretty ungrammatical sentence but sure you know what I mean.

At the start of Dead Man's Grip three people set out to their destinations early in the morning. Carly has said goodbye to her son and is driving to work; she has had a disastrous date the night before and is not feeling too good.   Stuart Ferguson, a long distance long haul lorry driver is delivering an order of smoked fish to Brighton, he has been driving for too many hours and is tired.  The third person is Tony Revere, a young American who has followed his girl friend to the UK, having given up his plans to study for a business degree at Harvard. He says goodbye to her and sets off on his bicycle.

So these three characters meet in disastrous circumstances and set in train a whole cycle of revenge killings, murder and mayhem.  I know this sounds very vague but don't want to give anything away at all and impossible not to if I go into any more detail.  Suffice it to say that this is one of the best of the Roy Grace novels, incredibly thrilling and full of tension and had me on the edge of my seat eager to found out what happens in the end.

Those of you who have read this series know that there is a story line of Roy Grace's missing wife running through each book.   Sandy upped and vanished some ten years ago and was never seen again. It has taken Roy a long time to decide to move on, now he has a new love and a new baby due soon and he decides the time is right to have Sandy declared legally dead.   Well, the reader knows she is alive and have a vague idea where she is even if Roy doesn't and she is gradually coming out of the shadows and by the end of this book we know that poor Detective Grace has shocks in store.  Beautifully done, tension mounting and I cannot wait to get my hands on the next novel.

Note:  a tweet from the author on Twitter the other day told us that the Roy Grace novels are featuring as a specialised subject on Mastermind on 22 July so keep an eye out for that.

Second goodie - Ghastly Business by Louise Levene.  It is 1929 and a girl is strangled in a London alley, the mangled corpse of a peeping Tom is found in a railway tunnel and juicy details of the latest trunk murder are appearing in the papers.

Into all this comes Dora Strang, a doctor's daughter with a passion for anatomy.  Denied her own medical career she finds a job as a filing clerk to a pathologist Alfred Kemble.  She is thrilled by the grisly post mortems (I wasn't...) and finds herself fascinated by the pathologist who fulfils all her girlish fantasies which she has gained from a secret collection of pornographic novels discovered in her father's surgery.

Dr Kemble strikes me as being seriously creepy and more interested in dead bodies than living ones but he and Dora embark on a furtive relationship and she gradually becomes more obsessed with his nasty world.    This part of the book can be a bit stomach churning and I will admit to skipping a few pages here and there and I am not totally sure I can say I enjoyed Ghastly Business but it certainly kept my attention.   There are very funny moments in it too, not least the description of Dora's lodgings and her ghastly landlady Mrs Frith whose meals are appallingly bad and who practices the meanest of economies.

"Mrs Frith's breakfasts had consisted of meat rissoles, atrocities devised with malice aforethought by the author of one of Mrs Frith's most trusted guides on catering matters; Cold Meat and how to Disguise it......their daily dinners were advertised in advance on a scrap of paper pinned up in the hall.....one of the more sick making suggestions was Curried Liver to be found in 'Dainty Dishes for Slender Incomes'.    Mr Haddon had, so far, consumed Mrs Frith's burnt offerings with the ravenous enthusiasm of an Alsatian at a kitten eating contest...."

After the murderer for the trunk murder has been found guilty, largely due to Dr Kemble's evidence, and hung another murder takes place and it is clear that an innocent man has been sent to the gallows.  Folloiwng another case where his word has been challenged, Dr Kemble's aura of invincibility begins to falter with dire consequences.

Great style and great wit and panache and a real page turner, BUT as I said earlier, some of the content made me feel mildly nauseous and Alfred Kemble was such an obnoxious man I find it difficult to understand what Dora found so fascinating about him - still, a good read and recommended.