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Published
by Quercus,
August 2013.
ISBN: 978-1-78206-416-9
August 2013.
ISBN: 978-1-78206-416-9
Marylebone Police Station, 1968.
Cathal Breen, the station misfit, has just left his partner down by
running away from a knife-wielding burglar.
To get him away from the taunts of coward, his boss sends him to
investigate the corpse of a naked young woman ... except that her death’s not
as simple as it seems.
This police
procedural takes the reader straight back into the other side of the
psychadelic 1960s: the police corruption and incompetence, the non-stop sexist
and racist comments, the lack of all the technology that’s taken for granted
today. Breen is diffident, old-fashioned
(he doesn’t even have a favourite Beatle!) and principled, not willing to
accept the obvious answers; his new partner, WPC Tozer, has the entree into the
Beatles fan club, likes modern music and parties, and is, shockingly, on the
pill. Real events – John Lennon being
charged with drug use, the Biafran war – are woven into the storyline, and the
period detail is well-researched. The
plot moves smoothly along, with an interesting variety of suspects and good
action sequences, but it’s not a sixties-style thriller; it has a much more
modern edge to it.
An interesting
police procedural that gives a real feel of station life in the sixties.
-----
Reviewer: Marsali Taylor
William Shaw was born in Newton Abbot, Devon,
and lived for sixteen years in Hackney. For over twenty years he has written on
popular culture and sub-culture for various publications including the Observer
and the New York Times. A Song from Dead
Lips is his first novel. He lives in Brighton.
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