“Somebody Told Me” by Stephen Puleston

Detective Inspector John Marco of the South Wales Police is just back from a three-week holiday in Italy. He’s called to a café in Cardiff, specifically to the storeroom. A body has been found, and the victim has been clearly executed, as in a professional killing. Marco’s assistant, Detective Sergeant Lydia Flint, recognizes the dead man as Felix Bevard, the owner of a minicab company long believed tied to drug trafficking, prostitution, and money laundering.

As it turns out, Bevard was just about reading to turn state’s evidence in a murder case – and on a former partner now serving prison time. It was the partner that the Wales police have desperately wanted to collar permanently.

Marco also discovers he has a temporary boss – his rather hated rival. And the rival turns out to have been one of the investigating officers in the murder case.

Somebody Told Me is the third DI John Marco mystery by Stephen Puleston, and it’s a winner. Puleston artfully combines crime investigation, police force politics, and Marco’s own romantic ups and downs into a satisfying police procedural.

Stephen Puleston

This novel is slightly different from its predecessors in that the reader knows who the likely culprit (or culprits) is. The puzzle lies in how Marco, Flint, and their team chase down the all-important “how” – the evidence. And it’s neither obvious nor intuitive, and will, in fact, require good old-fashioned slogging through the case.

Somebody Told Me is the last of three published DI Marco novels (and the last of six by Puleston). There’s word of another DI Marco novel in the works, and that’s a good thing. It’s a highly entertaining series.

Related:

My review of Brass in Pocket.

My review of Worse than Dead.

My review of Against the Tide.

My review of Devil’s Kitchen.

My review of Dead Smart.

My review of Another Good Killing.

Photograph: Night scene in Cardiff, Wales.