Book Review - Holly by Stephen King

 

Slow Horses and Dead Lions - Slough House series books one and two comparison to TV series

 

Over the last few weeks I've read the first two books in Mick Herron's deliciously moorish Slough House series - I didn't come to the books via the TV series, indeed it had somehow slipped under my rader. I discovered the books after  listening to some old episodes of Radio Four's Book Club and one episode (HERE) featured the author chatting with a studio audience about his books. I liked the author's style so much, particularly his modest humour and the audiences genuine love for the books that I had to check them out.

 The books, espionage thrillers with a twist since the main characters, an ensemble cast, are as far removed from James Bond as it's possible to be, even George Smiley is the height of glamour in comparison to the grimy gang that populate this world . The radio chat suggested that the books contained much humour as well as genuine thrills and feeling intrigued I took up my Kindle and downloaded the first book. That I immediately read the second and then watched both TV seasons that adapted the books is an indication that I very much enjoyed them. Oh yes indeed - I'll definitely be reading the rest of the series, as well as tuning into the wonderful TV series, Gary Oldman has never been better, whenever the third season arrives.

So what are the Slow Horses? Or rather who are the Slow Horses? Well, basically they are a team of British intelligence agents who for a variety of failures have found themselves relegated to the MI5's Slough House department - think of it as a school for losers, somewhere for incompetents to serve out their time until retirement, death or even both. Now you also need to know that Slough House is not in Slough but is called that because of a joke, apparently someone once said the department is so far from the action that it may as well be in Slough. So, that's basically it - the slow horses are a bunch of fuck ups, addicts and fools. Only they're not really - each character, from Jackson Lamb down are well rounded, realistic and just so lovable. Everyone loves an underdog.

The first novel and the TV series are very close to each other, though in truth the elongated climax of the TV version does improve on the book with the incredibly tense garage scene in which a kidnapped young man has to fill a van with petrol while his blood-soaked kidnappers hide inside the van. That scene is absolutely edge of the seat stuff but the book, although differing at the climax is just as thrilling and I do think the book offers a deeper understanding of the characters.

The second book, Dead Lions and the TV series differ a lot more and this book is undoubtedly the better of the two, but both are worth the effort. The plot of the book is if anything a little more fantastical than the TV version but it remains on the right side of credible thanks to the way the writer plots the story so that by the time we venture into JAMES BOND SAVING THE WORLD territory we are so invested that we go along with the story.

So TV series or books? Well, it must be remembered that they are two different mediums and what works in one may fall flat in the other, but I've always been a book guy and I am inclined to almost always favour the books, but the TV version is quite incredible in itself and Gary Oldman's portrayal of the odious and yet somehow endearing Jackson Lamb is a masterclass in characterisation. There's no need to chose when you can have both - each have their merits, and both are excellent.

A refreshing take on the espionage genre.

BOOK REVIEW - THE RITUAL BY ADAM NEVILL

 

There was a time, more years ago than I care to mention, when I read nothing but horror novels. I knew who the King was and I devoured page after page of his rambling prose, I was in love with the works of James Herbert, fascinated and often sickened by the splatter-punks. I would squeeze in a short story from the Pan Books between novels and I explored the likes of Koontz, Barker, Laymon, Lumley and others.

 I became personal friends with several dark scribes and even had one horror author (Steve Harris) come visit and stay several days while we drank whisky and talked genre history - a journey that took us from Stoker and Poe via Jackson, Lovecraft and down that dark winding road  to Stephen King and of course there was  a little Guy N. Smith thrown in for good measure.  Eclectic blood soaked days, indeed.

That was then though but these days apart from the odd Stephen King, and he's long broadened out from basic horror, I've not really explored the genre. So I'm not sure how I stumbled across The Ritual by Adam Nevill but I did, and all I can say is WOW! This is a brilliant read that showed me that not only was the genre alive and well but it remains as much fun as its always been.

It was the plot of the book - several city slicker friends out of their depths in the Scandinavian wilderness - which appealed because I am a great fan of nordic noir, and that particular sub-genre often skirts around the borderline of what we would call horror fiction.Of course the fact that the author's gained much praise from critics, even being called the British Stephen King also intrigued me.

After a few pages I was hooked and picked up the book at every opportunity - it starts off by exploring the fractured relationships between the four lifelong friends, before they take a wrong turning and become lost in an ancient forest where they are stalked by some sort of creature that may be as old as time itself. Throw in Viking legends, a death metal combo. the old Gods and a group of hillbillies that seem to have been spawned from a mating between Deliverance and the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Oh, and let's not forget that pitiful old woman who just may be the creepiest character in the entire book.

The author does an excellent job of creating atmosphere and the tension is handled so well that the pages just fly by, as the reader becomes engrossed in the well constructed and expertly handled story. Things do get gruesome in places but there is a lot of black humour that is positioned in such a way as to allow the reader to go with the more ridiculous sections of the narrative.

To sum up then this is a powerhouse of a horror novel - often terrific and never silly. That's quite an accomplishment.

Thursday Murder Club Book Review Richard Osman

 This is one of those books where the characterisation is far more important than the plot  - not that the plot itself is not well enough done, but it is the characters that carry the reader forward. The Book really is a joy to read - I couldn't put it down and didn't want it to end.

The four main characters are quite a varied bunch - they are all elderly and live in a retirement home where they pass the time with the Thursday Murder Club. The spend their time looking over cold cases in the hope that they can spot something the police failed to see - it hasn't happened yet though. No matter since there's plenty of lemon drizzle cake and tea to go round.

The four members of the murder club are made up of ( all retired), a spy chief, a nurse, a psychiatrist and a militant socialist.

Soon there is a murder in the area when local businessman Tony Curran is bludgeoned to death in his kitchen and the fantastic four and now on the case - 'Isn't it delightful. A fresh murder for us to look into.'

There are some beautiful character moments throughout the book, and a lot of poignant scenes that deal with the reality of growing old.

This truly is a fantastic book.

The John Wayne movie that never was

 

Billed as being by Mickey Spillane and Max Allan Collins, this is actually a novelisation by Collins of an unproduced script that Spillane wrote around 1959 for John Wayne.

The original screenplay was titled the Saga of Celeb York and during the time of writing Spillane and Wayne were good friends - in the introduction to the book Collins points out that the reason the script was never filmed was largely down to the fact that Wayne's company, Batjac lost a lot of money on the movie, The Alamo. 

Wayne of course directed, produced and starred in the Alamo and although the movie took a sizeable slice of the box office it failed to make money given it's huge production costs.

Had the Alamo made money then Wayne' next project would likely have been Spillane's screenplay, but instead Wayne opted for a string of safe though successful westerns, such as North to Alaska.

Reading the expertly written novel one can't help thinking that this was a missed opportunity - the books reads in a very visual style, perhaps because the source material was of course a screenplay. And most of the beats that take us from plot point to plot point are set out in a very filmic fashion. It's very easy to visualise the scenes in the reader's mind, which speaks volumes of Collins skill at penning a narrative.

In an untamed desert ruled by outlaws, Trinidad, New Mexico, appears to be an oasis of civilization. Sheriff Harry Gauge rules his town with an iron fist, a fast gun—and an unbridled thirst for power.

Rancher George Cullen would rather take a bullet than give in to the greedy sheriff's land grab. But a cattle empire isn't all Gauge wants—he also has his eye on Cullen's beautiful daughter, Willa. So Cullen gets word out that he's hiring the fastest gunslinger money can buy. When a stranger rides in, townsfolk wonder if this is the rancher's hired gun. Whoever he is, the stranger won't be pushed . . . and his aim is deadly.

It's a very good book and totally engrossed the reader throughout - I especially liked the way that the character of York was introduced and I felt it was a nice touch that the air of mystery was retained for most of the book. Is the gunman really Caleb York or some other shootist? Reports are  that York was shot down some time back by Wes Banion.

There's nothing truly original about the plot - it's your standard oater material but it's put together with skill and is truly an entertaining traditional style western.

Book Review: Sioux Dawn by Terry C. Johnston

 I first read this book, the first in the Plainsmen series, a few years back but h

aving fond memories off it, which were rekindled when I did my post on The Indian Wars, a week or so ago I decided to read it again. Once again it grabbed me from the first page, even prompting me to put Stephen King's third Dark Tower (the middle section with Jake's paradox was boring me) aside. I'll return to that book one day, having enjoyed the first two Dark Tower books, but Terry C. Johnston has put me in the mood to do a few epic westerns before I do so.

Now this novel which uses the Fetterman massacre as it main thrust is a mixture of both fact and fiction. Presenting the story through the eyes of the fictional Irish immigrant Seamus Donegan allows the author a certain amount of leeway in presenting the story of this dreadful period of American history.

On 21st December, 1866, Captain Fetterman and an army column of 80 men, were involved in protecting a team taking wood to Fort Phil Kearny. Although under orders not to "engage or pursue Indians" Fetterman gave the orders to attack a group of Sioux warriors. The warriors ran away and drew the soldiers into a clearing surrounded by a much larger force. All the soldiers were killed in what became known as the Fetterman Massacre. Later that day the stripped and mutilated bodies of the soldiers were found by a patrol led by Captain Ten Eyck.

The thing that I admire with Sioux Dawn is that the author manages to keep the story moving forward with the momentum of good fiction, and yet he doesn't skimp on including historical facts,and the reach of his research is all encompassing. The novel really gives us a taste of frontier life and can be appreciated on more than one level - as an enjoyable read and also a history of what really happened. It both entertains and informs which is not always an easy thing to pull off.

Excellent and, to my mind, the best of all the Plainsmen books.

Exit by Belinda Bauer BOOK REVIEW

Belinda Bauer is marketed as a crime writer, and yet she is only a crime writer in the sense that Stephen King is a horror writer, for like Mr King Belinda transcends a genre which is unable to contain her. Her previous book, the Booker Longlisted, Snap was one of the darkest and yet most heartwarming books I've read for many years and I raved about it to anyone who would listen. Her new book is much lighter in tone than the aforementioned masterwork, though it does concern a murder most foul. Trouble is it's the funniest murder any reader is likely to come across in all crime literature.

The cleverly constructed, ever so twisty plot concerns an organisation known as the Exiters - a group of kindly people who sit with terminally ill patients who have decided that suicide is the only way out of a life that has become nothing but misery and extreme pain. The exiters don't provide assisstance in the act of sucide but merely offer support when it is most needed - these people know how to stay on the right side of the law.

The book opens with 75 year old Felix, an experianced exiter and a young girl called Amanda (all good eyebrows and no experience) turning up at an address to aid in the suicide of an elderly man who is being tortured by cancer. However all is not as it seems and Felix and Amanda are horrified to discover that they have killed the wrong man. Felix being the noble sort decides to take the blame himself and keep Amanda out of it, but first he has to decide when to hand himself into the police but not, of course until he'd walked his dog.

 

What follows is an often hilarious thriller that keeps the pages turning as one unlikely event follow another until the final, didn't see that coming denouncement. In places the plot reminded me of Tom Sharpe, in others Agatha Christie but at the end of the day the book comes from an original voice and one of the most widly creative in all of the crime genre.

 Excellent.

Bait Money by Max Allan Collins - Book Review

 Bait money was originally published in 1973 and is the first novel from Collins who has since

gone onto to become a highly respected and often imitated luminary in the mystery/neo-noir genres. I first became aware of the author because of the work he was doing with the unfinished novels left behind by Mickey Spillane and it took me some time to read any of Collins own work. Being a British reader I wasn't that familiar with the writer, as he's never really been an household name this side of the pond and it best known for being the author of The Road to Perdition graphic novel which sparked off the successful movie starring everyone's favourite every-man, Tom Hanks.

Collins though is a highly successful writer and has several times won highly sought after literary awards, perhaps most notably, The Shamus Award which is given out by the Private Eye Writers of America - he's taken that beauty twice. If that wasn't enough Collins had a successful run penning the long running Dick Tracy comics books and also did a brief stint on DC's Batman. He's written for Dark Horse, DC, Marvel, Image and just about every big name comic publisher out there.

I think it's fair to say that if Collins was twenty years older he would have likely been one of the big names in Men's Adventure Paperback genre which boomed during the late Fifties to late Eighties, but the industry is very different today than it was then and the author has always worked between mediums and he continues to do so.

Back back to the book in question - Collins, like many of us, was a big fan of the Richard Stark Parker books and Bait Money introduces the character of Nolan who is directly influenced by Parker. In many ways Bait Money is a pastiche of the Richard Stark blueprint, but it's evident that there is enough meat on the Nolan character to make him very much his own character. In fact the story is that Collins sent a copy of the original manuscript to Bait Money to Richard Stark (actually Donald Westlake) and the veteran author have the young upstart his blessing. So let's get the nonsense of the Nolan series being a Parker rip-off from the table and judge the book on its own merits.

The book starts with Nolan on the run from the mob, having left the organisation after killing the brother of a high ranking mobster called, Charley. Now approaching the golden age of Fifty, Nolan is looking to retire from his shady life but must first make amends with the mob. Cue, a last big heist in which Nolan and a team of largely amateurs, including a comic book obsessed kid, whom I suspect Collins based on himself, make to rob a bank, pay off the mob and then settle down into the peaceful autumnal years. What follows is a fast moving, hardboiled story with some great details of the heist being planned and double cross laid upon double cross as we speed towards the climax of a truly fantastic read.

The flow of the book is excellent and the author's ear for dialogue is something to be envied - scenes where characters are exchanging smart arse remarks really give a feel for the genre and would sit comfortably in any classic heist movie. I found myself picking up the book whenever I had a few moments to spare and I'd read the entire thing in a couple of days. Quite an achievement these days with so many demands on my time. To sum up then I think Bait Money is a bloody fantastic read - a lean, mean, pleasure machine.

The Nolan series includes

1. Bait Money (1973)
2. Blood Money (1973)
3. Fly Paper (1981)
4. Hush Money (1981)
5. Hard Cash (1981)
6. Scratch Fever (1982)
7. Spree (1987)
8. Mourn the Living (1988)

Bait Money is currently available paired with the second novel, Blood Money, in the series from the wonderful Hard Case Crime under the title, Two For the Money. And this was the edition I read

Book Review: Death Wish by Brian Garfield

I was familiar with the Charles Brosnon/Micheal Winner movie (who isn't!) , but until now the original source novel by Brain Garfield (an author known previously to me for his many excellent westerns) had passed me by.

I picked up this novel for my kindle on a whim; having come across it whilst browsing and I very much enjoyed it. It's basically the same story as the movie it inspired, and it also justifies the actions of the vigilante that drives the plot in a similar fashion, but it contains much more depth than the the movie and leaves the reader empathizing with Paul Benjamin (Paul Kersey in the movie) and fully understanding, if not applauding him for bringing a kind of wild west gun juctice to the criminals who are ruling the streets of 1970's New York.

The novel fully gets inside the character of Paul Benjamin and shows us how an accountant, a life long liberal can step over that line and become the ultimate in right wing rhetotic - judge, jury and executioner. Much of the novel concentrates on the mundane aspects of the main characters life and his transition to madness is fully realized in a believable fashion.

It's not as nasty as the movie it spawned, and for that even more compelling, and it sense of time and place is vivid. I'd highly recommend this book.

Book Review: The Killing Habit by Mark Billingham

The Killing Habit is the fifteenth book in the hugely popular Tom Thorne series.

The previous Thorne, Love Like Blood was a truly exceptional crime thriller and it must have presented the author with quite a challenge to follow up, but thankfully Billingham was more than up to the task. Again the book uses highly topical issues as its starting point - this time dealing with animal cruelty. Specifically a series of cat killings - this case is based on the real life UK Cat Killings in which someone, still at large, is responsible for the brutal killings of hundreds of cats.

Thorne knows the serial killer archetype and is convinced that someone who kills cats, mutilates them and leaves their bodies on the doorstep for their owners to find them, will progress to killing people, indeed may have already done so. And so Thorne, once again teamed with DI Nicola Tanner begins to investigate. Thankfully the descriptions of the animal torture are mostly kept off scene, and it is not long before the plot moves on and becomes a cat and mouse game (excuse the pun) between Thorne, his team and the demented killer.

There is also a secondary though equally important plot in which Tanner is keeping a man in a safe house while she tries to track down a woman, known as The Duchess who has links to organised crime. As well as all that we also have details of the everyday lives of the main characters, and this soap opera aspect so necessary to long running series is something that Billingham does so well. Thorne is at odds with his partner Helen, feeling that her sister is coming between them and deliberately trying to ruin their relationship, Tanner still mourning the loss of her own partner is flat hunting and the rest of the regular cast put in their obligatory and entertaining appearance. I can never get enough of Hendricks, for example.

Billingham juggles everything with considerable skill and there is a real sense of urgency as the plot unfolds, which leads to a (I didn't see that coming) climax that will have major ramifications as the series progresses.

Later this week the Archive talks to the author in an exclusive interview.

Book Review: The Dry by Jane Harper

Set in a parched Australian landscape, Jane Harper's The Dry is a real page turner of a crime novel. Much was made of the fact that this was a debut novel, coming from a writer who worked on the book while taking a creative writing course. It's been a massive success, and has turned heads not only in the land down under, but worldwide - it was a Radio 2 Book Choice, named the CWA Golden Dagger Book of the Year, named the Sunday Times Book of the Year for 2017 and is currently optioned for a major film , with none other than  Reese Witherspoon attached to the project. The latest news is that the movie will start filming early next year. And before all that it won the Victorian Premier Literary Award for An Unpublished Manuscript.

One of the many strengths of the novel is that it so effectively creates a sense of place, which gives it a lot in common with the Nordic noirs which are so popular with readers, though where the abiding image of Nordic thrillers are the  desolate snowscapes, Harper's book operates in the polar opposite. It's Outback noir and the parched desolate landscape of the book goes a long way in creating a sense of dread. The land is dying before our eyes, people are living in a state of poverty and hopelessness so it is no wonder that violence soon flares up.

The novel opens with a swarm of blowflies swarming around the bodies of a mother and son, who were butchered in their own home in a seemingly straight forward murder/suicide. Luke Hadler, driven mad by years of drought seems to have shot both his wife and son before turning the gun on himself.

Melbourne based policeman, Aaron Falk spent his childhood in the town of Kiewarra but he and his father had to leave town after the death of a young girl - actually, they were driven out of town when suspicion regarding the young girl's death fell on Aaron. And now years later Aaron returns to the town for the funeral of Luke and his family and becomes involved in an unofficial investigation into the so called murder/suicide. Why for instance did Luke, assuming he saw a hopeless future for himself and his family not kill his infant daughter before turning the gun on himself? Why just his wife and young son?

Falk teams up with local policeman, Sergeant Raco (as likable a character as you can meet in crime fiction) and together the duo start investigating. At the start of the book there is doubt sown in the reader's mind over the involvement Falk may have played in the death of the young girl all those years ago, and this story in a secondary mystery that runs alongside the main storyline. I've called the book Outback Noir, as to some extent it is but this is basically a crime novel in the classic style with a myriad of twists and turns to throw the reader before the thrilling and logical conclusion plays out.

Book Review: The Beautiful Dead by Belinda Bauer

This  is the fourth book I've read by this author, after discovering her with the CWA award winning, Rubbernecker, and it most certainly won't be the last. She's actually got a new hardcover, Snap out at the moment and the book was one of my Father's Day gifts so I guess that goes onto my TBR pile. However let's go back to The Beautiful Dead which is available in both paperback and eBook.

The plot of the book is that Eve Singer, a TV crime reporter suddenly find herself gaining the attention of a twisted serial killer who wants her to tell his story. The killer claims that he and Eve have much in common; after all they both make their living from death. Eve as a crime reporter and the killer as a man who is convinced that it is only killing that keeps his own weak heart beating. When the killer first makes contact, Eve sees a chance to stay ahead of the competition in reporting of the latest killing spree across London, but gradually she begins to doubt herself and when a young girl is killed in front of her at a tube station Eve decides to go to the police. There now follows a pacey cat and mouse game between killer and reluctant reporter.

The killer is somewhat of a cliche as far as serial killers go, but the author displays great skill in making him at least believable, but the true beating heart of the novel is in Eve's relationship with her elderly father, Duncan who is suffering from Dementia. The book is set during the lead up to Christmas, and indeed ends on the big day itself. Is it a happy ending? Well, that would be telling but all I will say is that it is a suitably satisfying climax. And one that would not be out of place in a big budget blockbuster - Bauer is a very visual writer and one can imagine this making a very good movie or Television mini-series.

Another fantastic crime novel that may not take the genre into new territory, but uses all the tools of the genre to construct a fully enjoyable reader experience. Highly recommended.

Book Review - Darkness on the Edge of Town Brian Keene

I really enjoyed this book, got sucked into the apocalyptic story but the ending just threw the whole experience for me - it was a cold ending that didn't offer any payback for the time spent with the characters. It's a pity, because the story itself was compelling.

Comparisons to Stephen King are inevitable - Darkness on the Edge of Town is  similar to some of King’s works, including The Mist and Under the Dome - In fact at one point in the novel the characters take a device - that of forming a human chain to enter the dark - used in Stephen King's, Mist. The author is aware of this and has one of the characters say, 'I got the idea for this from that movie, The Mist.'

I liked that; it made me smile.

And to be honest writers borrow ideas from other writers all the time - Stephen King's The Mist for example owes a lot to James Herbert's, The Fog. In fact I could make a long list of books that have used similar engines to drive their plots, and maybe that's a subject for a future post.


  The plot is - one day the inhabitants of Walden, Virginia wake-up to darkness. The world as they know it is gone. All communication outside the town of roughly 11,000 has ceased, and an inky blackness has settled across the sky and near outskirts. The residents do not know what has happened or why. They don't even know if there is still a world outside the darkness, and it soon becomes clear that Walden may be the only town left on the entire planet.

The working class characters are superbly realised and the sense of dread drips from each and every word - the scene in a pet shop is particularly effective and if not for the ending I would have given this book full marks. Maybe the standard of the book was so high that delivering an ending that doesn't really go anywhere and wasn't really satisfying was even more galling. Still, I loved the book for the most part - this is the first I've read by this author, and I'll certainly be reading more.

Book Review: The Rats by James Herbert

It had been an age since I last read this book - in fact I'd almost forgotten about it. It was one of those books I loved during my teenage years, and must have read several times. It had started my love affair with the much missed James Herbert; a love that still burns to this day.

I was reminded of  it after finding a battered old paperback copy amongst a box full of old paperbacks I bought from a local boot sale - A kind of lucky dip. The box was stuffed full of old books. handwritten, in thick black marker pen,  upon the side of the box was '50 paperbacks, mixed titles, £5 the lot'

Well how could I refuse such an offer! There were several Louis Lamour titles visible towards the top of the box, a couple of Guy N. Smiths and several Edge westerns. There was no way of telling what goodies would be waiting  when I dug into this box of ancient delights. It was exciting picking up the box and taking it to my own car boot.

When I got the box home I found it actually contained 58 paperbacks, making it even more of a bargain - twenty of these books were Louis Lamour titles, there were ten Executioner books, three James Herberts (the Rats being one of them), five Edge westerns, ten Guy N. Smith titles, the rest were madeup of books from the Keyhole Crime series, two of these were by Simon Brett - I do like Simon Brett.

Anyway, I picked up the ancient copy of the Rats, taking in the aroma of its aged pages and started to read - three hours later I'd read the entire book.

In one sitting I'd lost myself in the grim world of 1970's London as the city suffered an onslaught of mutated rodents. When I'd last read this book I would have been a teenager, or in my early Twenties at the oldest. Back then I would have been a book obsessed reader who looked at authors as almost God like creatures, men and women who were set apart from the rest of us by their talent and brilliance. Now I'm in my early Fifties, a professional writer with several titles to my name in the bookshops, and I realise that published writers are not Gods, but merely people compelled by a need to tell stories. And you know reading the book now, coming at it not as a gore obsessed youngster but as someone who can understand the craft,  I think I really appreciated the brilliance of what Herbert did in this his debut book.

The story is told in a five act structure, superbly well paced with several interludes in which the reader gets to catch his/her breath before the mayhem starts again. There also a lot of metaphor that I likely missed as a younger reader - there is for instance a working class, semi-socialist subtext hidden amongst the horrific tale. It is true that the book has aged somewhat and some of it would fall foul to political correctness - blacks are described as coloureds (which was then the accepted term), women are not exactly passive but definitely second fiddle to the men, and homosexuality although treated with surprising sensitivity given the era, comes across as an abnormality. But then this was the early 1970's and the author is only describing the world he lived in at the time of writing. The London of this book for instance is very different to the city of today - The docks, which feature so prominently in the book as an industrial zone on its last legs has since been redeveloped into a gleaming and characterless ediface of neo-liberal greed. The now long demolished inner city slums are a breeding ground for the vermin who drive the story, and although these slums may now be consigned to the history books the city today suffers from a different kind of vermin, but don't get me started on that subject.

Back to the book.

The main character is Harris, an art teacher in an inner city school populated by tough as nails children. And after an opening in which an homeless homosexual is consumed by the rats we find our hero drawn into the story when one of his students turns up at school complaining that he has been bitten by rats. From there we are dragged through several set pieces - the underground scene is particularly effective as is the section in which the school is under siege from the killer rats. And the climax of the book is a masterclass in suspenseful pacing.

The Rats then is a far better book than I remember - yes it has all the gore that satisfied the teenage me, but there was a skilled writer at work here, and he delivered his story with panache and class. In fact for a book I must have read several times already, this reading was actually the most rewarding. It's quite brilliant.

Book Review: Where the Dead Walk by John Bowen

This book was independently published by the author, using Amazon's self-publishing system, and it shows the strengths of Amazon's opening up the road to publication for those without the support of a major publisher behind them - Where the Dead Walk is a truly captivating horror/supernatural thriller that holds the reader, vice like in a grip of pure suspense. It would be a terrible shame if a book as good as this was denied an audience on the whims of the publishing industry. As it turns out their loss is the reader's gain and I urge anyone who fancies a supernatural novel, that is well done, stays just the right side of ridiculous and will keep you guessing until the final page to give this book a try. It's reminiscent of James Herbert at his best, and the author is most certainly a name to watch.

Where the Dead Walk, is the name of one of those sensationalist reality TV shows that deal with the supernatural - think TV's Most Haunted and Ghost Hunters and you won't be far from the mark.  The show is hosted by Kate Bennett, a woman with a lot of personal tragedy hidden in her past.  When Kate and her producer, Henry are approached by the enigmatic Sabastian Dahl who had a property he claims is haunted, things take a turn for the weird.

There was a time when I read a lot of horror fiction, but over recent years I've not kept up with the genre and so I'm not sure why I decided to read, Where the Dead Walk. I'm glad I did though. I liked the idea of the reality TV show - it made it natural for the characters to stumble into a genuine case of the supernatural and helped the plot to avoid many of the cliches of the well worn haunted house story. In fact the cliches that are used here seem perfectly natural since the TV show at the heart of the plot relies on cliche, bumps and bangs and sudden changes in temperature.

It does everything a book like this should, and many is the time when I felt a shiver run down my spine while reading. To sum up then, Where the Dead Walk is bloody brilliant.


Find the author HERE

Book Review: Love Like Blood by Mark Billingham

'Writing about cultures and religions that are not your own brings with it a degree of responsibility, and so it should. I have endeavoured to do so with care, sensitivity and, crucially, with respect. In Love Like Blood I have tried to display the utmost respect for Islam, Hinduism, Sikhism and for those who practice their religions peacefully. ' Mark Billingham


Tackling a subject like this in a crime thriller is fraught with perils, but Billingham pulls it off and at no point does the book stray into needless sensation - This is the 14th novel featuring the author's series character, Tom Thorne - (I've been on a bit of a Billingham kick lately and this is the third novel of his I've read this month - back to back reading I add. This brings me up to date with the character, I believe there's a new Thorne novel due later this year) - and the subject matter gives the book a sharp edge. Razor sharp; you could slice a finger turning these pages.


When Detective Inspector Nicola Tanner's partner is murdered in their own home she is left seething with the need for vengeance and justice. She has been investigating a series of honour killings in the Muslim, Sikh and Hindu communities and she is convinced the murder of her partner is connected, but Tanner is pulled from the case, put on compassionate leave. She won't leave the investigation alone though and drags Tom Thorne into her case; unofficially of course. The book contains all the usual elements of a successful thriller - there are hit men, red herrings galore, more twists than a Curly Wurly and above all an engaging team in Thorne and Tanner. This book is nothing short of excellent and gives great insight into  honour based violence, which is something that is more common than we realise.

Official figures are that there are around a dozen or so honour killings in the UK each year, with around five thousand each year globally - a thousand of these killings take place in Pakistan alone. However according to the police many of these crimes are unreported and if you include assault, mutilation and kidnapping in with honour based violence then the figures are totally staggering. It is estimated that the true figure for the UK alone would be 20,000. Any woman who deviates from some arbitrary patriarchal law is at risk. You can be killed for simply smiling at someone the wrong way.

Billingham, in this book tries to separate the religion, of which he shows the utmost respect, from the honour crimes of which he hates, but he is walking a tightrope creating a fictional thriller around such an emotive subject. He pulls it off though....he pulls it off really well. The book does what it is supposed to  as a thriller, keeping the reader turning the pages, giving us believable characters but at the same time allowing us a glimpse of a world in which we know very little about.


'I've always thought if you write a book with an agenda,' Billingham told the Independant newspaper
at the time of the book's original publication. 'That you are going to write a bad book. 'And I stand by that. Even if I am writing something topical the story has to be front and centre. And it has to be character driven.'


'Honour killings have also been documented in Jewish and  Christian communities,' Tanners says in the book. 'If fact I think the only ones without blood on their hands are Buddhists and Rastafarians...maybe Jedis.'

All in all then another exceptional thriller from a crime writer who is at the top of his game...and one that could, excuse the cliche, have been ripped from today's headlines.

You can read the details of the true case that inspired Love Like Blood HERE

Book Review: Time of Death by Mark Billingham

This is the 13th book in Mark Billingham's series featuring his tough as old boots detective, Tom Thorne - I've not read the entire series but after really enjoying the previous book in the series, The Bones Beneath (review HERE) I felt the immediate need for more Thorne and so I started on Time of Death.

Like The Bones Beneath, which was something of a departure from the standard London setting of the novels, Time of Death also uproots Thorne to a different location and presents him in a somewhat unfamiliar situation. This time Thorne is not on a case at all, but on holidays with his partner Helen Weeks (also a cop and the main character in Billingham's novel, In The Dark which I have but have not yet read). However their planned holiday is called short when Helen decides to return to her hometown, Polesford in Derbyshire to comfort an old friend whose husband, Stephen Bates, has been arrested on suspicion of child abduction.

When one of the missing girls turns up dead, the police believe they have their killer and all of the evidence seems to suggest so, but Tom Thorne is not so sure and his suspicions soon put him at odds with the local police force while he heads towards a showdown with a ruthless, and bat-shit crazy killer. There is also suspense because the reader knows the second girl is still alive - will Thorne get to get before she too is finished off?

The main narrative though concentrates largely on Helen and her relationship with her old friend Linda  Bates- it shows how the lives of innocent people, namely Linda and her two children are torn apart when her husband, the children's stepfather is arrested initially for abduction and then charged on counts of both murder and abduction. As the evidence mounts up against the man a press feeding frenzy begins and the Bates family find themselves under siege from not only the press but hordes of angry people who seem to take it upon themselves to punish the family for the alleged crimes of Stephen Bates. This aspect of the story is handled extremely well and avoids the trap of becoming soap opera'ish. Not once does the ordeal the family go through seem anything other than real...real, unfair and bloody tragic.

Now the unspoken rule with crime books is that the author can't just pluck the guilty party out of thin air at the end of the book, the reader must have met the guilty party  during the narrative, and using this logic I figured I sussed it all out by the mid-way point. There were enough clues to point me in the direction I took only to have the rug pulled out from beneath my feet towards the novels end. It's at this point that you can stand back and see where the author led you on a merry dance - and in this book, Mr Billingham dances so well.

To sum up, Time of Death is a bloody excellent thriller with real depth of character, and Tom Thorne, Billinghams's main character, has become an excellent creation - an Everyman copper, who you'd quite like to sit down and share a pint with, but keep him away from the jukebox or you could end up line dancing down the high street after a bellyful of strong ale.

Book Review: The Bones Beneath by Mark Billingham

I've not read any of Mark Billingham's Tom Thorne novels for a few years - there's no real reason for that but I followed the series for maybe the first five books, getting the books as they came out,  before I started reading other series crime novels. I wanted see how other's authors tackled the problem of carrying the same character through a series of books and I went through a lot of Rebus, the entire Jack Frost series and of course the excellent Wallander books. Since then I'd become hooked on Nordic Noir and have been reading the likes of Jo Nesbo and going through the Jowall and Wahoo's Beck books. So many book and so little time.

I'd always intended to go back to Tom Thorne but for some reason (probably because I always had my nose buried in some book or other)  I never got around to it...until now. Reading the blurb for Billingham's twelfth Tom Thorne thriller I discovered that Stuart Nicklin played a big part - Nicklin was the deranged serial killer in the second Thorne book, Scardey Cat, and it was this reason that attracted me to the novel. My memories of Scardey Cat is that it was an exceptional thriller - it's a cliché to say you couldn't stop turning the pages but in the case of Scardey Cat I remember that as being true. In the years since then and now it seems that  Nicklin's become Thorne's Moriarty and from what I learned reading The Bones Beneath he's appeared in bit parts in several of the Thorne novels I've missed. I'll have to remedy that and go read the ones I've missed because, The Bones Beneath is absolutely brilliant.

It doesn't matter if, like me, you haven't read the entire series because in terms of the story, The Bones Beneath reads just a standalone thriller, it can be read on its own without any loss of enjoyment. It's pretty much a self contained story but of course there has been a lot of character development during the earlier books, but Thorne's just as I remember him, though these days he seems to be in a loving relationship and has only just returned to his Detective Inspector role after being busted back to a uniformed officer, for something that occured in one of the previous thrillers.

The Bones Beneath gives us Billingham's answer to the locked room mystery - well sort of, since the bulk of the book takes place on a remote Welsh Island with a limited cast of character. The weather's turned nasty and there is no way off the island which Thorne shares with deranged killer, Stuart Nicklin, another killer who is anything but deranged named Jeffrey Batchelor, seveal other police officers, a few prison guards and a myraid group of people who live on the island. The reason we are here is that there was once a young offenders hostel on the island, and Stuart Nicklin had been an inmate. Now Nicklin reveals that he once killed a fellow inmate there and wants to reveal where the body is to finally bring closure to the family - echoes of the real life drama when Ian Brady cruelly refused to reveal where he had buried the body of Keith Bennet despite the anguish this caused the young boys mother. Brady of course took that secret to the grave with him.

Nicklin though wants to show where the body of his victim is buried, but he has several conditions - firstly that his fellow, Long Lartin (a Catagory A high security prison) inmate Jeffrey Batchelor comes on the trip, and that the police officer leading the search is none other than his nemesis, Tom Thorne. Of course we know Nicklin has his reasons for these conditions but when the truth comes out towards the end of the book, you think - 'Shit, why didn't I spot that?'

The book plays out far differently that the reader expects and the suspense is excellently built up until we are, here's a variation on that cliché again, turning the pages at the speed of knots - the nautical term is apropos given that the sea plays such a part in the book.

Welcome back Tom Thorne....let's not leave it so long next time.

BOOK REVIEW: Darkside Belinda Bauer

This book is a sort of sequel to Black Lands, which I raved about, but it was not in the same league. It's not a bad book, far from it but it seemed disjointed to me and I'd guessed who the killer was by the half way point - it starts out very well but it's nowhere near as dark as Black Lands and on times trends in cozy crime territory. And that to me was a problem when I was reading - I like cozy crime but this story seemed to want to be dark psychological thriller and cozy crime at the same time and I just didn't find it as compelling as the other books I've read by the author. There is a another book that follows on from this one, Finders Keepers and I'm starting that one immediately, but only because I know how good the author is having read two of her other titles. If Dark Side had been the first book I'd read by this author then I probably wouldn't contimue.

The next book, containing several of the characters carried over from this one, should be interesting particularly knowing what I know about them from reading this one.

Book Review - Faceless Killers by Henning Mankell

This is the first of the Wallander books - I knew of the character, but had never read any of the books though I had seen several episodes of the TV series (the BBC version) and I'd promised myself I would check out the books one day. And so this week I picked up the paperback from my towering TBR pile and vanished between the pages.

It's a very dark book and Wallander is a brooding character. There's not much joy in this book - everyone's so miserable, and the main character seems to enjoy wallowing in misery. Mind you he doesn't have much to smile about - he lives alone, eats nothing but junk food, and loses sleep because he's always dreaming of a beautiful black woman. On top of all that he has to cope with the fact that his father is slipping into the clutches of dementia.

It takes awhile for the book to get going, but when it does the pace really picks up and for all his flaws Wallander is a compelling character. The plot sees the detective investigating a brutal double murder of an elderly couple and touches on hard hitting subjects such as racism and xenophobia. These latter points make the book as topical as a newspaper headline.

Noric Noir is the current thing, and this book, this series rather is considered to be a blueprint for the genre. I'll certainly be checking out more in the series - in fact I plan to read them in order and have already downloaded the second in the series to my Kindle. I guess when I've read more of the books I'll know how typical or atypical this book is of the genre itself. All in all I enjoyed this book and am glad I dipped my toe into the Wallander series.