“Written in Blood” by Stephen Puleston

Nicholas Wixley looks like he’s on top of the world. A barrister who ‘s just been named a judge, he’s spending the long Easter weekend at the holiday home in northern Wales owned by him and his wife. And his wife, a high-ranking police official in Manchester, is elsewhere. He’s there for the sailing, for relaxation, and for the high-class escort woman who just left his house. The doorbell rings, and he answers it. He sees who it is, and he frowns.

The next day, the cleaning lady finds Wixley in his bedroom, his throat slit, and an “E” carved into his chest. Detective Inspector Ian Drake and Detective Sergeant Sara Morgan of the Wales Police Service are called away from holiday plans to investigate. Because the victim is the spouse of a police official, even one from Manchester, the pressure is on to find the killer as quickly as possible.

From the beginning, Drake and Morgan find nothing straightforward. The murder looks to be a copycat of serial murders from some years before, and for which a man is serving several life sentences. Except it’s too close to be only a copycat – details never disclosed are included in the murder scene. The murderer is someone who had access to undisclosed court files. 

Drake and Morgan interview colleagues of the victim, spouses of colleagues, fellow sailboat owners, and friends, and slowly come to realize that nothing is what it seems on the surface. The victim had traces of cocaine in his nose. There are possible ties to organized crime. The victim’s wife may have dirty hands in getting police investigations stopped.

Stephen Puleston

Written in Blood by Welsh writer Stephen Puleston is another fast-paced installment in the Detective Ian Drake series. It’s full of twists and turns, lawyers with secrets to hide, a host of possible suspects, and Drake’s growing romance with his new girlfriend, which seems to be having a calming effect on his obsessive-compulsive disorder (he’s not washing his hands nearly as much as he did in the first novel).

Puleston publishes two series of Welsh police detective stories. Detective Inspector Ian Drake is with the North Wales Police Service, and Detective Inspector John Marco is with the South Wales Police Service. Written in Blood is the sixth Inspector Drake mystery.

Drake often drives his commanding officers and other superiors crazy, but they know he always gets results. And in Written in Blood, he will tirelessly track the killer down.

Related:

My review of A Time to Kill.

My review of Another Good Killing.

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 Speechless.

Top photograph: Cardigan Bay in Wales, showing the kind of view the murder victim had in Written in Blood. Photo courtesy Cardigan Bay Tourist Board.

“Devil’s Kitchen” by Stephen Puleston

Mystery writer Stephen Puleston has had Detective Inspector Ian Drake and Detective Sergeant Caren Waits of the Wales Police Service work their way through three significant crime novels (Brass in Pocket, Worse than Dead, and Against the Tide). Perhaps it was time to explain how they started working together in the first place. Or perhaps a “prequel novella” made good sense from a marketing perspective.

Regardless of the motivation behind it, Puleston’s Devil’s Kitchen is a good story.

Drake and Waits are called to a popular climbing and hiking area called Devil’s Kitchen (a real place, by the way) in the mountains of northern Wales, near their home base city of Caernaffon. A married couple have been found dead – she by stabbing and he by a fall. It certainly looks like an open-and-shut case of murder-suicide.

Something about the crime scene bothers Drake. He’s a brand new detective inspector, handling his first murder case. His rather neurotic tendencies toward cleanliness and fastidiousness in full flood in the three novels are showing themselves, but barely. Family tensions are just now coming to the fore. For Waits, she spends considerable time biting her tongue during interrogation of witnesses, knowing that Drake is her leader and she needs to learn how he works.

Stephen Puleston

Drake experiences the direct pressures of the police higher-ups to make a quick end to the investigation. He’s able to resist the pressure by appealing to procedure – he knows he and Waits have to be thorough in examining the lives of the two dead people and identifying a motive for the husband to have killed his wife.

The solution will turn out to be anything but the obvious.

Puleston is an engaging writer, creating two police investigators who are all too human and have their own odd quirks (although, to be fair, Drake seems to have more quirks than Waits). Their personalities become part of the investigation story, including both the things they see and the things they miss.

If you haven’t read Puleston’s Inspector Drake series, this “prequel novella” is a good, suspenseful introduction.

Related:

My review of Brass in Pocket.

My review of Worse than Dead.

My review of Against the Tide.

Top photograph: A view of Devil’s Kitchen in Wales, via Trip Advisor.