Some Wednesday Readings

Leaving Home to Save It – Michael Toscano at Mere Orthodoxy. 

What Happens When You Pay Ex-Gang Members to Stop Crime? Ask Chicago – Olivia Rheingold at The Free Press.

 

Eavesdropping on Tolkien – Joseph Pearce at The Imaginative Conservative.

 

The model writer – Gary Saul Morson at The New Criterion reviews Pushkin: A Writer’s Biography by Yuri Lotman.

 

Tolkien, Technology, Ideology, and Love: A Lecture at Hope College – Bradley Birzer.

 

Cuba’s Useless Idiots – James Kirchick at The Free Press.

On Tolkien Reading Day - Kelly Heller at Story Warren.

Photograph: Alexander Pushkin (1799-1837).

"Murder on the Dawn Princess" by Roy Lewis

It starts with a fishing boat finding a body floating off the northeast coast of England. No identification, no fingerprints, nothing to say who it might be. Eventually, enough information is shared between police in Britain and Interpol to suggest a possible identity – a man from Spain wanted for questioning in a case. 

Meanwhile, and oblivious to the case, Arnold Landon of the Morpeth Department of Antiquities & Museums is debating with himself about a job offer in the United States, one involving his friend Jane who seems to be taking up permanent residence there. And he’s still dealing with his boss, the beautiful if totally political Karent Stannard, who’s hired an executive assistant who’s as beautiful as she is. She asks Arnold to help orient the new hire, and the two investigate a complaint from a local estate owner that a neighboring estate, run by what looks like a cult, may be building on a noted archaeological site.

 

Arnold soon finds himself in a tangle of boss, politics, a cult-like leader, and the local historical society. And then the estate owner is found dead at the bottom of the tower of his home – and a very suspicious substance in his bloodstream. And Arnold begins to see a link between the man’s death and something he heard when he visited the possible new job in the States, not to mention the body found floating.

 

Roy Lewis

Murder on the Dawn Princess is the fifteenth novel in the Arnold Landon series by British author Roy Lewis (1933-2019). It continues the running theme of its predecessors – how a mild-mannered antiquities official seems to attract crime of all kinds, up t and including murder. And more to the point – how he helps solve them (much to the chagrin the local police and his boss). 

 

Lewis was the author of some 60 other mysteries, novels, and short story collections. His Inspector Crow series includes A Lover Too Many, Murder in the Mine, The Woods Murder, Error of Judgment, and Murder for Money, among others. The Eric Ward series, of which The Sedleigh Hall Murder is the first (and originally published as A Certain Blindness in 1981), includes 17 novels. Lewis lived in northern England. 

 

The Arnold Landon series, like the series for Eric Ward and Inspector Crow, is set largely in the period of the 1970s and 1980s. They’re classic, old-fashioned yet greatly entertaining mysteries without the DNA analysis, computers, mobiles phones, and other fixtures of contemporary crime novels. And they’re terrific reads.

 

Related:

Murder in the Cottage by Roy Lewis.

Murder Under the Bridge by Roy Lewis.

Murder in the Tower by Roy Lewis. 

Murder in the Church by Roy Lewis.

Murder in the Barn by Roy Lewis.

Murder in the Manor by Roy Lewis.

Murder in the Farmhouse by Roy Lewis.

Murder in the Stableyard by Roy Lewis.

Murder in the House by Roy Lewis.

Murder by the Quay by Roy Lewis.

Error in Judgment by Roy Lewis. 

Murder at the Folly by Roy Lewis.

Murder in the Field by Roy Lewis.

Murder at Haggburn Hall by Roy Lewis.

Murder on the Golf Course by Roy Lewis.

 

Some Monday Readings

 

Meaning & Membership – Elizabeth Stice at Current Magazine.

 

A Scrambled Story & a Puzzle to Solve: Vladimir Nabokov’s Pale Fire – Jeff Goins at Miller’s Book Review.

 

I’m a Liberal at a ‘Conservative’ University: How Did I End Up Here? – Boris Fishman at The Free Press.

 

Telling a Hopeful Story: Some notes on Hannah Coulter and the active voice – Gract Olmstead at Granola.

 

The Luxurious Death Rattle of the Great American Magazine – Joe Nocera at The Free Press.

"The Sting of the Honey Bee" by Roger Longrigg

Dan Mallett has to be one of the most unusual protagonists in a detective or crime story that I’ve ever read.

He’s not a policeman or private detective. He was once a banker, to please his mother, but he finally couldn’t stand the dailyness and tedium of it. So, he followed in the footsteps of his father: poacher and thief.

 

Dan has certain skills that lend themselves to detective work. He can quietly set traps for birds without the owner of the land aware of it. He has connections to fences for stolen goods. He knows how the police operate, and he knows the police really well. But what starts as a simple pony party for children will take Dan very close to death.

 

Roger Longrigg

A man arrives from London with his two young children, determined to buy the family farm he believes his father was cheated out of. The farm is occupied by two elderly and rather unlikeable sisters, who operate a pony riding business. The man makes a generous offer, which the sisters refuse. The man then takes a series of steps to force the two women to sell, and he covers himself extremely well. It’s a benefit that the local people have never liked the two curmudgeonly sisters and are glad to see them go.

 

The man, as it turns out, is connected to the London underworld. And he’s hired goons to frighten and terrorize the sisters. Dan’s more concerned about a pony he stole and hid among the sisters’ stock, and what the police will do when the sisters finger him. But he also sees what’s coming down on top the sisters’ heads, and he decides to help. Or he finds himself in such a fix that risking capture by the police may be the best option.

 

Sting of the Honey Bee is the second of the Dan Mallett novels by Roger Longrigg, writing as Frank Parrish. It’s less of a detective story and more of general crime novel; the only mystery is how Mallett is going to escape disaster and help the sisters survive the onslaught of a London gang leader. It’s got a bit of romance as well, with Dan admiring and somewhat falling for the pony trainer hired by the gang boss who has no idea what’s really going on.

 

Watching Mallett at work and pulling off a stunning upset makes the novel an absolutely fun read.

 

Longrigg (1929-2000) wrote numerous mystery and suspense novels under different pseudonyms. He used Frank Parrish for the eight Dan Mallett novels, and Ivor Drummond and Domini Taylors for others. He’s also published under his own name, both fiction and non-fiction, about foxhunting and horse racing. 

 

Related:

 

Fire in the Barley by Roger Longrigg.

Some Thursday Readings

 

The Legacy of The Lodger, Marie Belloc Lowndes’ Influential Jack the Ripper Story – Victoria Gilbert at CrimeReads. 

 

“The Unfortunate Fate of Septimus Wise”: A Ghost Story – Stephen Masty at The Imaginative Conservative.

 

“A Vagabond Song,” poem by Bliss Carman – Joseph Bottum at Poems Ancient and Modern.

 

Rose at the Golden Heart – Spitalfields Life.

"The Templeton Case" by Victor Whitechurch

Reginald Templeton is known as something of a world traveler and possibly even a millionaire. He arrives at Marsh Quay, a fishing village in South Downs on England’s Cheanel coast. The village is only two miles from the town of Frattenbury, where Templeton’s cousin is the canon at the cathedral. He does indeed visit his cousin, but he also has other appointments, “business” left undefined. Early one morning, Templeton is found stabbed to death on his yacht. 

Detective Sergeant Colson of the local police is assigned to investigate. At the inquest, the canon discloses he picked up something on the floor under his cousin’s body – a cigar band, which he promptly stuck in his pocket and forgot. And a walking stick in found in the small dinghy used by the murderer to gain access to the yacht.

 

Victor Whitechurch

Early on, it appears there are three good suspects. Colson goes through the gradual elimination of each, until he reaches a blind alley. None of his three prime suspects could have committed the murder.

 

The Templeton Case by Victor Whitechurch was first published in 1924 and has now been republished in e-book format. It’s a mystery that seems to have no solution, until things take a rather unexpected turn. It also contains anti-Semitic references which are jarring to read today, but they likely would have passed unnoticed in 1924.

 

Whitechurch was a Church of England clergyman as well as a crime novelist. He wrote seven mystery novels and one collection of mystery stories, most featuring a clergyman as a main character. He was well known enough to become one of the founding members of the Detection Club, along with Agatha Christie, Dorothy Sayers, and G.K. Chesterton. His best-known literary character is the amateur railway detective Thorpe Hazelle.

"The Grave Tattoo" by Val McDermid

The Grave Tattoo by mystery novelist Val McDermid is one of the most unusual mysteries I’ve read in a very long time, perhaps the most unusual ever. The main narrative is based on a true story and a long-held rumor connected to that story. The actual crimes, when they occur, happen very late in the story. And while drawn very well and in great detail, it’s difficult to muster sympathy, or empathy, for any of the characters. 

That said, the story is so well done that you’ll read it to the end.

 

Jane Gresham is a university lecturer in London, specializing in William Wordsworth and the Romantic poets. Her parents and brother live in the Lake Country – Wordsworth county – and that’s where Jane grew up. A long-held belief by people in the area concerns Wordsworth and a fellow school classmate, Fletcher Christian, he of Mutiny on the Bounty fame. The legend is that Christian returned to England, made contact with Wordsworth, and Wordsworth wrote down Christian’s story and transformed it into a poem, one never found. 

 

Jane is ambitious; she’s seen a hint in a misfiled letter in the archives as the Wordsworth Museum in Grasmere, and she knows that if she can find it, her career is set. As it is, she has to hold down two jobs to make ends meet and live in a council house in London. She’s been “adopted” by a 13-year-old girl named Tennille who lives there as well; the girl hates school but loves poetry. Her mother is dead; she’s being raised by an aunt. Her father is rumored to be the gangster who runs all the illegal activities in the council housing project.

 

Then a “bog man” is discovered, a body found in the peat bogs common in the Lake country and preserved. This one is about 200 years old and bears tattoos common in the South Sea Islands. Jane, and others, think it may well be Fletcher Christian. She convinces her university boss to let her search for the Wordsworth manuscript and returns home. Then things get really interesting. Jane’s not the only one looking for the lost manuscript. And people begin to die.

 

Val McDermid

If there’s a characteristic common to all of the characters in the story, it’s ambition, and often unbridled ambition. Jane wants to make her name. Her brother Matthew wants to get some of the credit; he and Jane aren’t on good terms. Jane’s former boyfriend is deceitful. The forensic anthropologist investigating the bog man wants to make her name, too. No one really stops to wonder at the ruthlessness masked and sometimes shown to elderly people who might know something, or some the barely legal activities the characters engage in. Even 13-year-old Tennille is on the run for trying to cover up a crime. 

 

Yet The Grave Tattoo is so compelling that you continue to read on. Is there a manuscript? Will it be found? Is the bog man Fletcher Christian? And who’s killing people? Like I said, it’s an unusual mystery story.

 

A native of Scotland, McDermid attended St. Hilda’s College in Oxford and spent 14 years as a journalist in Devon, Glasgow, and Manchester. Her first novel was published in 1987, and she left her journalism career in 1991 to write full-time. Her crime novels have sold more than 16 million copies worldwide and been translated into 40 languages. She lives in Manchester and Edinburgh. The Grave Tattoo was originally published in 2006.

"The Hope That Kills" by Ed James

Detective Inspector Simon Fenchurch is haunted by ghosts. There’s the ghost of his failed marriage with Abigail. And there’s the ghost of his kidnapped-and-never-found daughter Chloe. And now he has working on a case for the Metropolitan Police in London that has the ghosts of his daughter all over it.  

A young, likely 16-year-old prostitute is found brutally murdered in an East End building slated for demolition and redevelopment. There’s no ID, no apparent motive, no witnesses, and a dead CCTV camera. The guard who supposedly is responsible has seen or heard nothing, she says. Slowly, very slowly, do Fenchurch and his team unravel the mystery, with an offhand comment here, a vague recollection there, some help from the local villains, and both help and obstruction from the team handling vice. 

 

The victim is about the age his kidnapped daughter would be. Fenchurch has never been able to resolve in his own mind – and heart – what happened to Chloe. It cost him his marriage. It keeps him at arm’s length from people. And it’s loaded him with guilt.  

 

Ed James

A second victim is found, this time in an obscure section of a car park. It’s like the first one, except this time there is CCTV coverage. All signs point to a banker, who’s rather conveniently found dead when the detectives go to his flat to question him. He’s died of an apparent overdose of heroin, but things don’t sit well with Fenchurch, and the post-mortem will bear him out. The killer was himself murdered.

 

The Hope That Kills is the first in the DI Simon Fenchurch series by Ed James. It is a gritty, absorbing police procedural with an emphasis on the plodding, unexciting but vital work that solves crimes. 

 

James is the author of several crime, mystery, and police procedural novels. He has six books in the DI Simon Fenchurch series, eight in the Scott Cullen series, three in the Cullen & Bain series, three in the Craig Hunter series, two in the Vicky Dodds series, and one in the Corcoran & Palmer series. Formerly an IT product manager who wrote during his daily commuting and travel times, he’s now a full-time writer living in the Scottish Borders area of the UK.

 

The Hope That Kills has a sympathetic lead detective, a haunting back story, solid supporting characters, and a fast-paced narrative that keeps the reader guessing. And don’t forget the edge-of-your seat conclusion. 

"The Dentist" by Tim Sullivan

Detective Sergeant George Cross of the Avon and Somerset Police does everything – absolutely everything – by the book. He never cuts a corner. He meticulously writes and turns hi his reports, and on time. He’s known for being a bit strange; when he first joined the force he was bullied, but never seemed to mind. He’s makes a lot of his colleagues uncomfortable, with his prolonged face-to-face silences and inability to have normal social interactions.  

But prosecutors love him; his cases have a 97 percent completion and conviction rate. They never have to worry that a DS Cross has been bungled or will get thrown out for some procedural reasons. 

 

DS Cross has Asperger’s Syndrome. 

 

His boss has assigned DS Ottey as his partner; she seems to be the only one who can tolerate him, although she’s nearly desperate to be reassigned. As much as Cross drives her crazy, she knows she always learns something from him, that he thinks very, very differently than most policemen, and he has an astounding success rate. 

 

Tim Sullivan

Cross is assigned to investigate the death of a homeless man. It looks open and shut – another homeless man seems ready to take the rap. But Cross isn’t convinced. And because his chief knows his reputation, he’s allowed to investigate. The open-and-shit case turns out to be anything but. It connects to an unsolved murder from years before and to what looks like deliberate malpractice by the investigating police officer. 

 

The Dentist by British author Tim Sullivan is the first in the DS Cross crime series, and it’s a riveting story, as much for the depiction of a police detective with Asperger’s as for the interesting story line. Sullivan allows the reader to get inside Cross’s head, and we come to see the world as cross understands it. 

 

Sullivan has been a film director, screenwriter and novelist. His credits include sitcoms, televised crime drama like Maigret and The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes (starring Jeremy Brett). His movie screenplays include A Handful of Dust(starring Kristen Scott Thomas, Judi Dench, and Alec Guinness) and Where Angels Fear to Tread (with Helen Mirren and Helen Bonham Carter). He also directed Coronation Street and Thatcher: The Final Days, among others. 

 

The Dentist a fine mystery, with an intriguing investigating detective, and a well-constructed plot that keeps the reader guessing until the end. It was such a good read that I immediately bought the second in the series, The Cyclist.  

Stories of Art and Crime, edited by Lawrence Block

A dock worker at the Metropolitan Museum of Art falls into an opportunity to sell paintings attributed to Renoir but really aren’t.  

A Gauguin painting of “Girl with a Fan” tells several stories simultaneously, including the World War II bombing of the famous Van Gogh “Yellow House.” 

 

Using a Hieronymus Bosch painting as a guide, someone is someone is killing people. 

 

The desire to find cave paintings as significant as those of Lascaux lead to a story of revenge. 

 

Charlie the barber is trying to get past PTSD after imprisonment by the Japanese in World War II; he may look like a Norman Rockwell painting, but he’s anything but.

 

Lawrence Block

These are five of the 17 stories using works of art as their inspiration in Alive in Shape and Color, edited by prolific (and legendary) mystery and suspense writer Lawrence Block. This volume followed a successful and similar effort: In Sunlight or in Shadow: Stories Inspired by the Paintings of Edward Hopper. Most of the same writers signed on to the second volume, so they must have enjoyed the venrure as much as the reader does. 

 

In addition to block himself, the writers include Lee Child, Michael Connelly, Jeffrey Deaver, Joyce Carol Oates, Nicholas Christopher, Gail Levin, and more. They each chose the painting they wanted to write a story about, and the artists represented (in addition to the ones mentioned above) include Georgia O’Keeffe, Salvador Dali, Balthus, Auguste Rodin, Rene Magritte, Michelangelo, and more. 

 

Most are crime stories (they would be, given the authors), but a few fall into the category of horror. All of the stories are dark ones, or they tell stories that examine the dark side of the human soul and mind. A particular favorite is “Orange is for Anguish, Blue for Insanity” by David Morrell, in which more than one person faces insanity in tracking down what happened to Vincent Van Gogh and his own insanity. 

 

Art, crime, horror – if you like the combination, Alive in Shape and Color is a veritable feast.

"Crimes of August" by Rubem Fonseca

It’s 1954 Rio de Janeiro. Alberto Mattos is that rarest of all birds – an honest police detective in a department where everyone’s on the take. Everyone, including his boss, his subordinate, the cops on the beat, and all the other departments. He is also that rare bird who believes in following the law, which means letting suspects go when there’s no evidence. 

It’s a perilous time in Rio and Brazil. A failed attempt to kill a journalist is leading to protests, condemnations, and the military beginning to become more than restless. Politicians, even those who support the current president of the country, are considering changing allegiances for their own safety and survival. The press is do its best to keep public opinion inflamed. One senator, a supporter of the president, has his plate full of worries, including the possibility that his own involvement in graft and corruption may come to light.

Mattos is called to a murder scene. A man of about 30 has been found strangled in his bed; he turns out to be the head of a finance and trading firm at the center of graft and corruption. The evidence is strange – blood on the bed does not belong to the victim, and someone, likely the killer, took a shower after the murder. The man’s wife is having an affair with the husband of a former girlfriend of Mattos. Mattos soon learns that every suspect has a motive, and every suspect has an alibi.

Rubem Fonseca

Through a multitude of interlocking and overlapping circles of relationships, Mattos must thread his way through passion, infidelity, corruption, political instability, and colleagues who assume they are the law. And all the while he’s nursing a serious stomach ulcer.

Crimes of August by Rubem Fonseca was first published in Portuguese in 1990. The English edition, published in 2014, was translated by Clifford Landers. It is a dark tale, tracking several different stories simultaneously, all framed by the detective’s investigation but eventually leading to a fusion of motives and events. Fonseca included a number of real people as characters and real events, artfully blending them into a coherent story. The novel includes a multitude of names, some looking and sounding close but actually belonging to characters. As a result, the novel requires a close reading, but the reward for doing so is a large one.

Fonseca began writing later and he specialized in crime writing. He lived most of life in Rio de Janeiro. He became a police officer in suburban Rio in 1952, writing the crime reports that would later become the basis for his stories. He studied business administration at New York University from 1953 to 1954, returning to the police force in Rio until 1958. He began writing stories in the early 1960s, and published his first collection, “The Prisoners,” in 1963. His works were often censored by the Brazilian military government for their violent and sexually graphic content. Fonseca received numerous prizes for his writing, including the Luís de Camões Prize for Literature and the Juan Rulfo Literature Prize for Latin American and Caribbean Literature. He died in April of 2020.

While Crimes of August is set in a Brazilian city some 66 years ago, and published 30 years ago, at times it seems eerily contemporary and transcending its geography – fearful and power-hungry politicians, elites who believe the law doesn’t apply to them, crime in the streets that seems out of control, and a press less concerned with the news and more concerned with using its power to bring down a government. It’s a compelling story.

Related:

The Taker & Other Stories by Ruben Fonseca.

The Lost Manuscript by Ruben Fonseca.

"Midwinter Mysteries" - A Christmas Crime Anthology

Midwinter Mysteries is an anthology of 11 stories set in the Christmas period – but the stories are vary widely in geography and time. Generally, they’re written by authors who have crime series novels and detectives (in fact, what first attracted me to the anthology was seeing it included stories by Cora Harrison and Keith Moray, whose works I’ve previously read). 

“Away in a Manger” by Graham Black is set in Old Town Square in Prague, and police are on patrol, looking for pickpockets and possible robberies in the crowded area. A Christmas theater presentation is going on, and there’s a lot more to it than a simple Christmas play.

“Footprints in the Snow” by J.C. Briggs in set in the England of 1850. Charles Dickens had expected to be at home in Devonshire Terrace in London for Christmas Eve, but heavy snow has trapped him and his fellow guests at Fareaway Abbey, the country home of Sir Gaston Fareaway and his wife, the Lady Adelina. Dickens does what he does best on Christmas Eve – he tells a ghost story. But it’s a story that’s a bit too close to home for one of the guests.

“Lost and Found” by Keith Moray is set in West Uist, in the Orkney Islands of Scotland, in 2012. It’s almost Christmas, and Inspector Torquil Mackinnon is introducing his sergeant Lorna Golspie to his friends and fellow musicians at a party. One of the musicians is found dead the next day, and it appears to have been killed by someone at the party who knew him well.

“The Spirit of Christmas” by Cora Harrison in set in London in 1858, and it stars Alfie and his band of orphans who are caring for each other in Victorian England (Harrison has written several mysteries involving the boys). Blind Sammy, with his beautiful voice, is singing for coins in front of Hamley’s Toy Shop in High Holborn when he suddenly disappears, replaced by a man who sings badly and doesn’t look like Father Christmas at all. A crime is going down, and Alfie and his friends have to find Sammy.

In “The Stolen Santa Sack” by Sean Gibbons, cabbie Ben Miller is driving along a motorway at 2 a.m. right before Christmas, and he has a problem. He has a dead Santa Claus in the back of his cab, the same Santa Claus that Police Superintendent had had him pick up at a hotel to bring to an address 17 miles away. Along the way, Santa was murdered.

“Will Power” by Marilyn Todd is set in the London of 1895, photographer Julia McAllister returns home from an assignment to find her home burgled. The only thing stolen was a set of prints from a recent wedding, and Julia desperately needs to get those prints back.

“Christmas Spirits” by Gaynor Torrance is set in contemporary Wales. Detective Inspector Jemima Huxley is looking for a murder suspect and receives a tip he’s been spotted in Cardiff near a church. Their timing is bad; large numbers of schoolchildren are gathered for the singing of Christmas carols. The suspect is a no-show, and on the way back to headquarters she and he police partner make a stop at a shop. She asks a salesperson dressed as an elf for help, but the elf turns out to be something else entirely.

For “The Essex Nativity” by David Field, we’re back to the England of 1895. Detective Sergeant Jack Enright of the Essex Constabulary is anticipating 10 days of leave for the Christmas holiday, but is suddenly faced with dealing with a reported burglary at a nearby farm. And then things get complicated. 

“Secret Santa” by Kim Fleet is set in contemporary England. It’s two days after Christmas, and private detective Eden Grey is grousing about the holiday when a note is passed under the door of her flat. All the note says is, “Who is following me?” Grey is going to find out – and find out who slipped the note under her door.

“Sir Up Sunday” by M.J. Logue goes way, way back – to the London of 1665. King Charles II needs a book found. It’s meant to be a present for his wife, the queen, and it’s up to Major Thankful Russell to find out what happened and get the book back. Or else.

The final story in the anthology is “The Christmas Ghost” by Linda Stratman, set in Brighton, England, in 1871. Mina Scarletti is known for exposing fraudulent spirit mediums, and she’s been called to the home of Mrs. Calverdon. It’s almost Christmas, and Mrs. Calverdon sees her son sitting in the room with them as they talk. The problem is that her son is dead.

These are all fun Christmas mysteries, providing both holiday entertainment and an introduction to 11 mystery writers and their fictional detectives.

Top photograph by Rodolfo Marques via Unsplash. Used with permission.

"Nowhere to Hide" by Stephen Puleston

Dawn Piper, a recovering drug addict, is making her way carefully through the Saturday night streets. She has a destination in mind, a friend’s house, but she wants to arrive there, and she’s watching for a black Audi that is likely following her. The friend’s house is within sight when she hears the voice, “Hello, Dawn.” Her body is found in her flat, but it’s clear she’s been killed somewhere else. 

Detective Inspector Ian Drake and Detective Sergeant Sara Morgan of the Wales Police Service investigate. And Drake has his hands full with non-investigation stuff – community meetings organized by a rabble-rousing politician; his boss retiring and a new superintendent arriving who seems distinctly cold and calculating; trying to balance time with his children and his new girlfriend (Drake is divorced). He also continues to obsess with neatness, coffee, and his Sudoku games.

Stephen Puleston

Drake and Morgan and their team gradually learn that Dawn’s death may be tied to local crime bosses and others running drugs into Wales. A second death occurs. Drake’s former wife, with the children in the car, is run off the road – a clear warning to the detective. Then there’s a third death, and the mysterious black Audi is playing a role again.

Nowhere to Hide by British author Stephen Puleston is the latest entry in the Detective Ian Drake detective series. 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. Nowhere to Hide is the seventh DI Ian Drake novel.

It’s a solid, fast-paced police procedural story, complete with drug kings, semi-civilized gangsters, departmental politics, and an ongoing romance. 

Related:

My review of Written in Blood.

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.

4 Stories by Glenn McGoldrick

British author Glenn McGoldrick writes stories. Period. That’s the fiction form he uses, and, so far, he’s stuck to it.

McGoldrick once worked for a cruise line, so it’s no surprise that one series of his stories is about cruise ship operations. Another series is his Dark Teesside stories, set in towns in northeastern England near the River Tees (the city of Newcastle is close by). 

What all of McGoldrick’s stories have in common is crime. Here are three of the Dark Teesside stories.

In Red Marks, an unemployed man named Michael Atkins boards a bus and discovers a forgotten purse. He pockets the cash in the purse, and then gradually tracks the purse’s owner. And then he watches, biding his time. What we learn along the way is that Atkins almost strangled his former girlfriend. It’s a chilling story, as if we’re watching the birth of a serial killer. 

Breaking Spirits is a story of double revenge. A young man follows a man from a pub one night, and coldly murders him. The victim is an enemy of the young man’s father, who’s previously served prison time. The young man’s mother committed suicide, and his father had a lot to do with it. Guess who’s going to get framed for murder?

 

In Dead Flies, a man’s adult son has been missing for three years, and it’s now officially a cold case file. The man is still buying a cake to celebrate his son’s birthday, and he replays the last days he and his wife spent his son. It’s a story about people desperate for answers and none are forthcoming.

Not Eligible for Rehire is one of McGoldrick’s cruise ship stories. A woman and her husband work for a cruise ship; they’re getting a divorce but still sharing a cabin. The woman comes to Human Resources and says her husband has been smoking marijuana. The cabin is searched, marijuana found. The man is tested but no trace of the drug is found. An investigation follows; he’s eventually dismissed, not because he was guilty as much as the need for the company to do something. HR is convinced that the lied, but what can it do about her? The story may be about a cruise line, but it fits a significant part of corporate thinking.

McGoldrick’s stories are dark tales, indeed, bringing us into the dark places of the human heart.

Glenn McGoldrick