Published by Mulholland Books, 4th July 2013.
ISBN: 978-1-444-73878-0
Like many books these days, this book starts with a prologue. I generally
don’t find them interesting. Usually they are about an unknown person being
killed, and as as you don’t know who the person is, and therefore have no real
feeling about them, the point of a prologue generally escapes me. However, regardless of any knowledge of the
person involved, this is a gripping prologue for the sheer strength of the
writing which descriptive powers had me there, on that underground.
This is the second in the series
featuring psychologist Alice Quinn.
Following the death of one of the senior executives of Angel Bank one of
London’s most successful investment banks she is asked by DI Don Burns to work
with him to build a profile of the killer.
Alice
had not been too enamoured of DI Burns the last time they worked together but
he seems somewhat changed since she last saw him so she agrees. To get a handle
on the case and the world of banking Alice
attends a bankers do at ‘the oldest gentlemen’s club in town’. And here she
meets Andrew Piernan.
The discovery of a second body,
also associated with Angel Bank, together with a postcard of an angel from the National Gallery, and a handful of
white feathers seems to signify that they have a serial killer taking out
employees of Angel bank.
Alice leads a complicated life, her drug-addicted
brother Will has sort of moved into her riverside flat, although he retains his
dilapidated van which he often retires to when things don’t go his way. Her
mother is a nightmare, and Darren, one of her schizophrenic patient’s is
stalking her. But her friend Lola is a
sweetie.
As Alice and DI Burns investigate
in London’s hottest summer on record, her only
respite seems to be the growing attachment she has to Andrew Piernan, but Alice is terrified to
commit herself, after the violence of her last relationship. (see Crossbones
Yard).
When Alice is attacked one night she assumes the
‘Angel’ killer has her in his sights but where was Darren? The tempo steps up as the killer’s campaign
continues with the chief target being Max Kingsmith, Director of the Angel
Bank. Alice suspects that Poppy Beckwith, London’s
highest paid prostitute is implicated in the killings, but no one takes her
seriously.
If you have read Kate Rhodes first
book Crossbones Yard you will be
aware that Kate is clearly a talented writer.
And A Killing of Angels only
her second book puts her up there with the best in crime friction today.
------
Reviewer: Lizzie Hayes
Kate Rhodes was
born in London.
She has a PhD in modern American literature and has taught English at British
and American universities. She spent several years working in the southern
states of America, first in Texas, then at a liberal arts college in Florida.
Kate’s first collection of poems Reversal was published in 2005, her second collection, The Alice Trap was
published in 2008. The Guardian described her poems as “pared back and
fast-moving, the short lines full of an energetic lightness of touch”. Kate has
been awarded a Hawthornden Fellowship, and her poems have been shortlisted and
won prizes in a number of competitions including the Bridport Prize and the
Forward Prize. Kate is currently writing full-time and lives in Cambridge with
her husband Dave Pescod, a writer and film maker. Crossbones Yard was Kate’s first crime novel. The second novel in
the Alice Quentin series, A Killing of
Angels was published July 2013.
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