A POLICEMAN'S LOT AND SHERLOCK HOLMES AND JACK THE RIPPER

The Archive's been quiet this week, but I've been on set of a new version of the Sherlock Holmes stories for the BBC. Sherlock - it looks interesting folks and should be seen later in the year. As a huge Holmes fan it was great for me to work on the show.

The end of this month sees my western, Arkansas Smith - so expect some big-time promotion here this month. However jumping forward to the summer when my mystery/crime novel A Policeman's Lot will be published - initially as an eBook and then a paperback a month or so later. I've managed to get hold of the readers report on the book and I thought I'd like to share this:


A Policeman’s Lot, by Gary Dobbs. Murder mystery. 56K words. Fascinating concept, setting, and characters. Set in Wales during Buffalo Bill’s 1903/1904 tour of the United Kingdom, the story begins with Inspector Frank Parade carrying out his daily duties in the town of Pontypridd, duties complicated by the unprecedented presence of 500 members of Buffalo Bill Cody’s Wild West Show encamped outside the town, not to mention the thousands attending the show every day. A series of depraved murders quickly makes things even more complicated. Buffalo Bill stands squarely in his path when Parade tries to investigate the likely possibility that one of the hundreds of show members is involved. And soon enough Parade’s own superiors are blocking his inquires, too. Still more deaths occur as Parade sifts through the thin evidence available and finds a trail that may lead to the perpetrator of the most heinous crime of the 19^th Century—London’s “Ripper” murders. Before the story is done, Parade develops a dramatic theory that may solve the Ripper mystery, as well as the murders he faces in idyllic Pontypridd. The story itself is wonderful—clever and intense.