‘Mystery in White’ by J Jefferson Farjeon

Published by British Library Crime Classics,
25 September 2014.
ISBN: 978-0-7123-5770-8 (PB)
Originally published in 1937.

On Christmas Eve, the 11.37am train from Euston to Manchester came to an unofficial halt.  And a group of people find themselves stranded in the snow, as the guard informs them that there is no chance of the train moving.

Several passengers decide to leave the train and try to walk to another station down the line,  but poor visibility leads them off the track and eventually they take shelter in an remote empty house, amazingly with tea laid out and a kettle humming on the hob. Maybe the sight of a bread knife in the middle of the kitchen floor should have given then pause for thought. But maybe shelter and a cup of tea is all they wanted at this point.

Initially the only passengers identified in the book are a brother and sister, David and Lydia, Carrington, but an elderly gentleman does identify himself as Robert Thomson, without a P, as he quickly informed them. Later they are joined by other travellers from the train and they learn that there had been a murder on the train. During the trek from the train Jessie Noyes had fallen in the snow, twisted her ankle and passed out. Also from the train seeking shelter, are a Mr Hopkins, a Mr Smith and a Mr Edward Matley. Quite an assorted group.

In his introduction to this book Martin Edwards says ‘although today little is known of this author, he was a major figure during the Golden Age of murder between the two world wars. Indeed his novels were admired by Dorothy L. Sayers, who called him "unsurpassed for creepy skill in mysterious adventures"

There is without doubt an Agatha Christie feel about the book, as people disappear. The thing I enjoy most when reading crime fiction is when the roots of the puzzle lie in the past, and therefore to solve the mystery the past has to be unravelled. There is a spooky feeling to the house they have stumbled upon And a rather high body count.

A dark atmospheric classic mystery, with a twist at the end, like all good mysteries. Recommended.
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Reviewer: Lizzie Sirett

Joseph Jefferson Farjeon (4 June 1883 – 6 June 1955) was born in Hampstead, London. He worked for ten years for Amalgamated Press in London before going freelance.  An English crime and mystery novelist, playwright and screenwriter. was the grandson of the American actor Joseph Jefferson, after whom he was named. His father, brother and sister also developed successful careers in the literary world. His "Ben" novels were reissued in 2015 and 2016.

‘Fatal Forgery’ by Susan Grossey

Independently Published,
12 July 2013.
ISBN: 978-1-91600190-9 (PB)

1824, in London. Constable Sam Plank of the magistrates’ force has just arrested respected banker Henry Fauntleroy for forging the signatures to various documents. If he’s found guilty, he’ll hang ...

Trial stories are always a good hook, and this one’s a winner. For a start, there’s the fascination of how exactly a trial was conducted two hundred years ago, and we follow Plank and Fontleroy through the whole process: the arrest, the preliminary hearing and Fauntleroy’s incarceration, then the second hearing, his transfer to Newgate and finally the trial. It’s written so vividly as to feel like time travel. Then there are the characters. Fauntleroy is intriguing right away – the charge-sheet sounds like just another fraudulent banker (we know all about them nowadays!) but a crowd of witnesses to his good character come forward, and his behaviour is strange – why isn’t he defending himself? The narrator, Sam Plank, is drawn in too – and he’s a great character, a solid, honest policeman with a supportive wife, Martha. He knows the people in this early C19 London: the clerks and lawyers in the court, the magistrates and justices, and the wardens of prisons Coldbath and Newgate. His search leads him out into the suburbs, and a woman with two little girls – was Fauntleroy as squeaky-clean as he pretends? The chapters are short, making for a quick read, the progress of the trial is compelling reading, and the final reveal is completely unexpected.

This historical PP is the opener in what promises to be an excellent series, with a well-plotted story, gripping characters, a vividly described setting and a clever end twist.
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Reviewer: Marsali Taylor

Susan Grossey has always made her living from crime – for twenty-five years as an anti-money laundering consultant and now writing historical financial crime novels.  In 2012 she published what she thought was a standalone book set in London in 1824, but it turned out that the true hero of Fatal Forgery was a magistrates’ constable who insisted on having a further six books written about him.  When he retired in 1829, Susan turned her attention to her hometown of Cambridge and the University constables who were created there in 1825.  She has published Ostler – the first of five planned novels narrated by university constable Gregory Hardiman – and is currently wrestling with the second in the series.  

Susan Grossey – Historical crime writer

Marsali Taylor grew up near Edinburgh and came to Shetland as a newly qualified teacher. Marsali is a qualified STGA tourist-guide who is fascinated by history, and has published plays in Shetland's distinctive dialect, as well as a history of women's suffrage in Shetland. She's also a keen sailor who enjoys exploring in her own 8m yacht, and an active member of her local drama group.  She lives with her husband and two Shetland ponies.

www.marsalitaylor.co.uk 

‘Deadfall’ by Aline Templeton

Published by Allison & Busby,
21 November 2024:
ISBN: 978-0-7490-3154-1 (HB)

 DCI Kelso Strang’s personal life has moved on since his last case. The fifth in this engaging series set in a variety of Scotland’s small towns saw him start a romance with young lawyer Cat Fleming; at the beginning of book six, the relationship has progressed and Cat is moving into the cottage on the coast which Kelso calls home when he isn’t away on a case. He is head of Police Scotland’s Rural Crime Squad, which takes over major investigations when the local force lacks the resources and manpower to do it themselves.

They are both hoping for some down time from work, to let their relationship settle into its new shape; but crime pays no heed to other people’s lives, and Cat’s boxes aren’t even unpacked before duty calls Kelso away. He has to leave Cat to her unpacking when the co-owner of a large estate is found dead, and the post mortem reveals that it wasn’t the accident it first appeared. 

The dead man is Perry Forsyth, recently returned to his childhood home from the bright lights of Edinburgh, where his lucrative career in property has come to an abrupt end. It soon becomes plain that Perry was not a popular man, and his death works to the advantage of a number of people who have designs on the ancient forest which forms most of the family estate. His sister Oriole has continued to live there, and sees herself as the guardian of the trees and wildlife. A local consortium of dubious businessmen want to buy the land cheaply to build a luxury hotel. A small-time academic sees potential for a study centre which would enhance his failing career. And then there’s Jay, Perry’s wayward teenage son, who adds a layer of complication by going missing.  

It’s down to Kelso to dig down into the layers of deceit and self-interest in order to identify the murderer and find the missing boy. His sidekick DS Livvy Murray is forced to make the arduous two-hour journey to and from Edinburgh every day because the budget won’t stretch to accommodation for her. They very soon becomes suspicious of Keith Drummond, one of the local inspectors, but fortunately finds an ally in DI Hamish Campbell. And to cap it all, the new chief superintendent is on a witch hunt, determined to root out corruption.

Kelso finds a way through the tangled web to the truth, but not before other lives, including his own, are put in danger. Meanwhile back at HQ in Edinburgh, his boss DCS Jane Borthwick is fighting a battle for the future of the Rural Crime Squad. Cat is discovering first-hand how it feels to be the much younger partner of a senior police officer: a complex mixture of pride in his achievements, resentment and some outmoded attitudes in the force, and gut-wrenching fear for his safety.

Kelso Strang is rapidly becoming one of my favourite police procedural protagonists: he’s efficient and perceptive, and also very human, with emotions and frailties which he isn’t afraid to show. In each book Aline Templeton places him at the head of a well-rounded and true to life set of characters, some recurring, most passing through. The series is going from strength to strength; long may Kelso continue!
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Reviewer: Lynne Patrick

Aline Templeton grew up in the fishing village of Anstruther, on the east coast of Scotland not far from St Andrews.  The memories of beautiful scenery and a close community inspired her to set the Marjory Fleming series in a place very like that – rural Galloway, in the south-west of Scotland. After attending Cambridge University to read English she taught for a few years.  She now writes full-time.  Her most recent series features DCI Kelso Strang, officer in charge of Police Scotland’s Serious Rural Crime Squad. There are six books in the series.  

http://www.alinetempleton.co.uk

Lynne Patrick has been a writer ever since she could pick up a pen, and has enjoyed success with short stories, reviews and feature journalism, but never, alas, with a novel. She crossed to the dark side to become a publisher for a few years and is proud to have launched several careers which are now burgeoning. She lives in Oxfordshire in a house groaning with books, about half of them crime fiction.

‘Murder at Whitechapel Road Station’ by Jim Eldridge

Published by Allison & Busby,
21 November 2024.
ISBN: 978-0-74903146-6 (HB)

This is the fourth book in Eldridge’s London Underground Station Mysteries Series and, as with its predecessors, is set during the Blitz in WW2. The former Whitechapel Road Underground station is being used as an air raid shelter and a body is found in one of its nooks and crannies. Not only has this woman been stabbed, she has also been eviscerated. A battered Victorian doctor’s case containing surgical tools has been left nearby. Was that meant to be found? Once the dead woman is identified as a prostitute, it is inevitable that the ghost of Jack the Ripper starts to hover over proceedings.

DCI Edgar Coburg, or Edgar Saxe-Coburg to give him his full name, of Scotland Yard is brought in. Coburg comes from a privileged family (he is the younger brother of Magnus Saxe-Coburg, otherwise known as the Earl of Dawlish). Assisting him, as before, is DS Ted Lampson. Before long, as they say, the plot thickens. Coburg is summoned to a meeting at Buckingham Palace with King George VI and Winston Churchill, the prime minister. One of the monarch’s valets, Bernard Bothwell, has gone missing, and they want him found. They also claim that a watch has disappeared, and this appears to be a major concern. Coburg is told that everything must be kept quiet, and he cannot tell even DS Lampson. In an entertaining aside, the king wonders whether he (his family name being Saxe-Coburg-Gotha before George V changed it to Windsor) and Edgar Saxe-Coburg are distantly related.

At this point there is nothing to link the cases, but it soon transpires that Bothwell has family connections with Whitechapel – and Coburg does not like coincidences. Early in the novel we become aware that there is ‘The Watcher’, someone who is keeping an eye on the police activities around Whitechapel. Magnus Saxe-Coburg and his valet Malcolm have been asked by Churchill to scout potential sites in Whitechapel for more air raid shelters. Whoever ‘The Watcher’ is manages to persuade some local toughs that the pair are Nazi spies, and consequently they get beaten up. Meanwhile, another two women are murdered: one is also eviscerated, but the murderer is interrupted whilst attempting to do the same to the second yet manages to escape.

Such is the importance attached to Coburg’s investigation into the disappearance of Bothwell (which gives the reader the impression that there is more to it than meets the eye) that he is taken off the underground station murders. Lampson and others continue looking into them, but it is not long before the cases merge to one extent or another. A discovery is made that drags Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson into the story.

There are interesting developments from the previous novel in the series. Ted Lampson and Eve are now married (Lampson lost his first wife), and Ted hopes that his son Terry will start to call Eve ‘mum’ rather than Eve. Added period detail comes through Coburg’s wife, Rosa, who is a jazz musician. During the novel she hosts the first of what is hoped to be a series of concerts broadcast live from the Maida Vale Studios, and artists such as Vera Lynn, Flanagan and Allen and the Crazy Gang make appearances.

This is an enjoyable and easy read. Eldridge likes dialogue, and there are relatively few descriptive passages to get in the way of the fast-moving and engaging plot. Characters such as ‘Cheerful Charlie Brown’, a reporter on the Whitechapel Chronicle, add to the fun. If the previous novels have caught your attention, I’m sure you will not be disappointed by this one.
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Reviewer: David Whittle

Jim Eldridge was born in the Kings Cross/Euston area of north London in November 1944. He left school at 16 and did a variety of jobs, before training as a teacher. He taught during the 1970s in disadvantaged areas of Luton, while at the same time writing. He became a full-time writer in 1978. He is a radio, TV and movie scriptwriter with hundreds of radio and TV scripts broadcast in the UK and across the world in a career spanning over 30 years. He lives in Kent with his wife, 

http://www.jimeldridge.com/   

David Whittle is firstly a musician (he is an organist and was Director of Music at Leicester Grammar School for over 30 years) but has always enjoyed crime fiction. This led him to write a biography of the composer Bruce Montgomery who is better known to lovers of crime fiction as Edmund Crispin, about whom he gives talks now and then. He is currently convenor of the East Midlands Chapter of the Crime Writers’ Association.

‘In Harm’s Way’ by Judith Cutler

Published by Joffe Books,
24 May 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-83526590-1 (PB)
Originally Published 24 March 2008 as
Still Waters

Simon Gates has recently taken up the post of Deputy Chief Constable in the Kent County Constabulary.  Deputy Chief Superintendent Fran Harman not only knows him but was also his line manager before he left Kent some twenty-five years earlier.  Gates has enjoyed a stellar career, and Fran is ambivalent about his return; he was and still is a closed book, and Fran wonders what the “new broom” plans to do to make his mark in his current role.

An altogether different personality is Sergeant Jim Champion.  Jim had been Fran’s supervisor and mentor when she first moved into the Criminal Investigation Department.  He eschewed the greasy pole of promotion while those he had trained, like Fran, moved up the ranks.  She still respects and admires her old teacher, though, and when Jim shares his concerns about a recent violent death, she takes notice.  Ten days earlier, a man called Alec Minton fell from the fifth floor of an upmarket hotel in the seaside resort of Hythe.  Investigators have decided that he committed suicide, but Jim isn’t convinced and his concerns prompt Fran to make a few discreet enquiries of her own.  Then she comes across a case of murder dating back several years. The victim’s body has never been found but two men are currently serving prison sentences for the crime.  As she continues her scrutiny of the cold case, some of Fran’s colleagues become rattled.  The question is, why? And just how far will they go to stop her from finding out the truth?

The novel’s tight plot and sub plots weave together to produce a multi-layered and unpredictable thriller populated by characters who are colourful, credible and sometimes inscrutable. No one could accuse Fran Harman of being a shrinking violet, yet even she, now older and menopausal, is judged on received orthodoxies that write off women of a certain age. The novel treats such issues seriously but with a commendably light touch alongside the intriguing and sometimes shocking investigation into Minton’s unexplained death. The book also explores the domestic circumstances that concern Fran when she is off duty. Her relationship with fiancée Mark is relatively new and they are still flitting between their respective homes. This delicate arrangement is threatened when Sammie, Mark’s daughter, asks for her father’s help and he finds himself dealing with conflicting responsibilities. These transitions and overlaps between home life and professional duty are deftly balanced and add to the tension as well as the realism of the book.

In Harm’s Way, explores themes that are as relevant today as they were in 2009 when the novel was first published as Cold Pursuit. This, the third of the Fran Harman Mysteries, can be read perfectly well as a stand-alone novel.

Carefully crafted characterisation within a complex, often chilling, narrative make In Harm’s Way a fascinating and highly enjoyable read.
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Reviewer: Dot Marshall-Gent

Judith Cutler was born in the Black Country, just outside Birmingham, later moving to the Birmingham suburb of Harborne. Judith started writing while she was at the then Oldbury Grammar School, winning the Critical Quarterly Short Story prize with the second story she wrote. She subsequently read English at university. It was an attack of chickenpox caught from her son that kick-started her writing career. One way of dealing with the itch was to hold a pencil in one hand, a block of paper in the other - and so she wrote her first novel. This eventually appeared in a much-revised version as Coming Alive, published by Severn House. Judith has eight series. The first two featured amateur sleuth Sophie Rivers (10 books) and Detective Sergeant Kate Power (6 Books). Then came Josie Wells, a middle-aged woman with a quick tongue, and a love of good food, there are two books, The Food Detective and The Chinese Takeout. The Lina Townsend books are set in the world of antiques and there are seven books in this series. There are three books featuring Tobias Campion set in the Regency period, and her series featuring Chief Superintendent Fran Harman (6 books), and Jodie Welsh, Rector’s wife and amateur sleuth. Her more recently a series feature a head teacher Jane Cowan (3 books). Judith has also written three standalone’s Staging Death, Scar Tissue, and Death In Elysium. Her new series is set in Victorian times featuring Matthew Rowsley. Death’s Long Shadow is the third book in this series.  

http://www.judithcutler.com 

Dot Marshall-Gent worked in the emergency services for twenty years first as a police officer, then as a paramedic and finally as a fire control officer before graduating from King’s College, London as a teacher of English in her mid-forties.  She completed a M.A. in Special and Inclusive Education at the Institute of Education, London and now teaches part-time and writes mainly about educational issues.  Dot sings jazz and country music and plays guitar, banjo and piano as well as being addicted to reading mystery and crime fiction.  

‘Poor Girls’ by Clare Whitfield

Published by Head of Zeus,
7 November 2024.
ISBN: 978-187393086-9 (HB)

Clare Whitfield’s third novel is based on real-life characters with a lifestyle you couldn’t make up: the Forty Elephants, a team of 1920s working class women who broke the mould they were expected to settle back into after fulfilling men’s roles throughout the First World War. After a taste of respect, freedom and decent wages, a handful were unwilling to return to a life of servicing the men whose jobs they had done and become wives or domestic servants. Instead, they decided to provide for themselves, by embarking on a well-organized life of thieving from those who were determined to tread them down.  

Eleanor Mackridge is working as a waitress, ignored or abused by the rich clientele, when she meets John, an amiable rogue, who introduces her to his glamorous sister Chrissie. Within weeks, Eleanor has changed her appearance and her name and joined a ‘cell’ of feisty young women who earn enough to buy their own jewellery and fur coats – through shoplifting their way through London’s upmarket department stores and selling on their loot.

Nell, as she becomes, emerges as spirited, ambitious and intelligent. She reluctantly cuts herself off from her family, who would never approve of the way she comes by the considerable sums of money she is able to send them. Her new family consists of the girls in her cell: impulsive Effie, friendly Charlie and sensitive Lily. The novel charts their adventures in and out of the tight knit Forty Elephants: their assaults on the department stores, their relationships with men and other women, and their extra-curricular ventures, one of which almost leads them into serious trouble.

The novel is littered with quirky and fascinating characters: Jay, the lesbian driver; Peter, Nell’s lover who inevitably comes to a sticky end; the Anns, two wizened crones retired from active thieving, who teach Nell her craft; and of course, Alice Diamond herself, statuesque Queen Alice who rules the Elephants with a rod of iron; and many more besides. On the other side are Nell’s downtrodden sister Steph; PC Horace Bevan, who takes a shine to Nell but becomes her nemesis; and a host of snooty shop assistants, rude restaurant clientele and corrupt magistrates, who place the readers’ sympathies firmly with Nell and her fellow thieves – engaging and honest crooks everyone.  

It’s a crime novel like no other I’ve encountered, and its solid proof of the old adage truth is stranger than fiction. And it’s a jolly good read into the bargain.
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Reviewer: Lynne Patrick

Clare Whitfield is a UK based writer living in a suburb where the main cultural landmark is a home store/Starbucks combo. She is the wife of a tattoo artist, mother of a small benign dictator and relies on a black Labrador for emotional stability.

Lynne Patrick has been a writer ever since she could pick up a pen, and has enjoyed success with short stories, reviews and feature journalism, but never, alas, with a novel. She crossed to the dark side to become a publisher for a few years and is proud to have launched several careers which are now burgeoning. She lives in Oxfordshire in a house groaning with books, about half of them crime fiction.

‘The Widow’ by Helene Flood

Published by Quercus,
10 October 2024. 
ISBN: 978-1-52940607-8 (HB)

This is the third in Helene Flood's trilogy of stand alone thrillers.  The Therapist, The Lover are the previous books, and all the books have different narrators but are linked by the same police characters.  The author is Norwegian and the translator is Alison McCullough.  

This is a domestic tale about the death of a man and the immediate effect this death has on his wife Eva - the narrator - and their three grown children with supporting characters in the form of neighbours, friends and the Police.  It is in a very original format - jumping from the past and the present in practically every chapter and keeps one gripped at every turn.  It is both scary and fascinating and always believable. 

Evy is shocked by the sudden and unexpected death of her husband Erling in a cycling incident but almost immediately she is confronted by strange happenings in their home, unexplained doors left open and possessions missing and most worrying the autopsy on her husband Erling's body showed no signs of the medications he was taking that might have prevented the fatal heart attack.  Eva has been drinking heavily and her memory is patchy but she becomes convinced that her husband's death was not an accident. 

Slowly the characters of Eva, the children and Erling are revealed.  No one is perfect and each character is potentially dangerous.  The chilling and twisty tale reveals a shock to the whole family when Erling's Will is read and the following events involving family and friends are both compelling and irresistible to the reader.  A thoroughly enjoyable Scandi thriller and I absolutely loved it!
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Reviewer: Toni Russell

Helene Flood is a psychologist who obtained her doctoral degree on violence, revictimization and trauma-related shame and guilt in 2016. She now works as a psychologist and researcher at the National Centre for Violence and Traumatic Stress. The Therapist is her first adult novel. It has been sold in 27 counties and film rights have been bought by Anonymous Content. Her second novel, The Lover, will be published in English in 2022. She lives in Oslo with her husband and two children.

Toni Russell is a retired teacher who has lived in London all her life and loves the city.  She says, ‘I enjoy museums, galleries and the theatre but probably my favourite pastime is reading.  I found myself reading detective fiction almost for the first time during lockdown and have particularly enjoyed old fashioned detective fiction rather than the nordic noir variety.  I am a member of a book club at the local library and have previously attended literature classes at our local Adult Education Centre.  I am married with three children and five grandchildren

‘Paddling in the Dead Sea’ by Carol Westron

Published by Pentangle Press,
26 October 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-91755500-5 (PB)

After many years of unhappiness and in fear of her life, Gina Grey finally flees from her abusive husband Doug. With her pet rabbit Bungy and a few clothes, she moves into a small studio flat in Galmouth - just 40 miles away from her oppressive spouse. She is terrified that he will track her down and knows that this may be a temporary stop. Nonetheless, she needs an income and has therefore applied for a job at the nearby Art College. Builder Bill Knight, her landlord, is still putting the finishing touches to other rooms in the large house. One is for his daughter Rachel, the others will be rented to her student friends Kathy, Chris and Nerissa. On the ground floor live two older ladies, Mrs. Johnston and Dr. Grim who were sitting tenants when Bill purchased the building.

Notwithstanding her own insecurities, Gina instinctively warms to the young people with whom she now shares a home, and particularly to Chris Harland.  After a difficult start in life, Chris became dependent on drugs and was recently remanded in prison on several charges.  The most serious allegation was dropped, embarrassing the police officers involved.  Since his release, Chris has tried hard to rebuild his life and recently enrolled on a Fine Arts programme at the same college where Gina hopes to find employment.  But mud sticks, and some of the college staff see the student only as a recovering addict and convicted criminal. Chris is also being watched, some might say hounded, by local police officers who feel his misdemeanours warranted a harsher punishment than just a few months on remand.  Meanwhile, the drug gang who exploited him are loathe to let him go and seek every opportunity to tempt him back into using drugs. Gina is aware that Chris is no angel, but she knows how it feels to be trapped, vulnerable and lack self-belief. She too must rebuild her shattered life whilst resisting her violent partner’s attempts to force her to move back in with him. As their confidence increases, Chris and Gina decide to confront their fears and their aggressors rather than hope for the best. It’s a brave thing to do and before long they find themselves in situations that are difficult, dangerous and might be deadly.

As always in Carol Westron’s writing, her rich variety of characters drive the plot as they delight, infuriate, and sometimes mislead the reader. There is also a clear focus on relationships positive and negative, with a specific focus on motherhood and mothering. Gina is the obvious, but not the only person who embodies the qualities of motherhood.  Her first-person narrative is inviting and emotive, and I loved her sometimes whacky and frequently self-deprecating humour. Some, whom one might least expect to exhibit maternal traits, also show an ability to mother and puncture preconceptions about this important theme.

Paddling in the Dead Sea is the second novel in the Galmouth Mysteries series.  Characters from the first book, The Fragility of Poppies, appear in supporting roles, but the book can be read perfectly well as a stand-alone. 

Witty, warm, tense and thought provoking it is a compelling read and highly recommended.
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Reviewer: Dot Marshall-Gent

Carol Westron is a successful author and a Creative Writing teacher.  Her crime novels re set both in contemporary and Victorian times.  Her first book The Terminal Velocity of Cats was published in 2013. Since then, she has since written 8 further mysteries. Carol recently gave an interview to Mystery People. interview

www.carolwestron.com 

Dot Marshall-Gent worked in the emergency services for twenty years first as a police officer, then as a paramedic and finally as a fire control officer before graduating from King’s College, London as a teacher of English in her mid-forties.  She completed a M.A. in Special and Inclusive Education at the Institute of Education, London and now teaches part-time and writes mainly about educational issues.  Dot sings jazz and country music and plays guitar, banjo and piano as well as being addicted to reading mystery and crime fiction.  

‘Nobody’s Hero’ by M.W. Craven

Published by Constable,
10 October 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-40871760-8 HB

Ben Koenig has a condition which makes it impossible for him to feel fear. He has been through intense training to discover what someone who has this complaint is capable of, his handler is Jen Draper and they are given many government contracts.

At London’s Speaker’s Corner a homeless looking woman kills two pickpockets and seems to abduct another woman – or was she rescuing her? The police are baffled, the killer seems to have vanished into thin air.

Later the “homeless” woman is identified as a person Ben Keonig had been instructed to make seem to disappear ten years ago.

His knowledge and expertise are needed to discover why she has resurfaced. He is based in the US. and is called in by the highest authorities dealing with top security, who send him to London with Draper.

Once there they are taken to the US. Embassy and told about the discovery of a supposed plot to bring disaster to the U. S. A. It seems to be connected to the woman who Koenig made disappear all those years ago and it has the title of Acacia Avenue Protocol. No one has any idea what it actually means.

So begins Koenig and Draper’s task of discovering what heinous crime is planned. As Keonig gets deeper and deeper into the plot, he realises how devastating it is. Part of it concerns finding out what possible cargo can a small boat be carrying that seems to be the centre of it all. He also discovers it’s all well and good not feeling fear, but it does lead him into a very precarious life-threatening position, taking others along with him. He leaves a trail of murder, mayhem and destruction in his wake. However, it will be well worth it if he can prevent the incredible destruction planned, but can he?

What a great thriller, full of heart stopping gung-ho action and a huge amount of dark humour. Plus, as an added bonus there is a really surprising ending.

I cannot recommend this book too highly for lovers of the good old-fashioned stop at nothing, death defying hero, righting wrongs, or attempting to!
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Reviewer: Tricia Chappell

M. W. Craven was born in Cumbria in 1968 but grew up in the North East. He trained for two years as an armourer before spending the next ten being paid to travel the world and drink ridiculous amounts of alcohol. In 1995, sick of writing postcards and having fun, he decided it might be time to do something a bit more sensible. And it doesn't get more sensible than doing a law degree. So, he did Social Work instead. Two years later he started working in Cumbria as a probation officer. Sixteen years later he took the plunge and became a full-time writer. Mike's first Washington Poe novel The Pupped Show, won the Gold Dagger for best novel in 2019.  The Botanist, published in 2022, the fifth book in the series won the Gold Dagger in s  four books in the series. A fifth book is scheduled for publication in 2022.  He lives in Carlisle. Mike is a member of the Crime Writers' Association, the International Thriller Writers' Association, and the Mystery People Group.

http://www.mwcraven.com/  

Tricia Chappell. I have a great love of books and reading, especially crime and thrillers. I play the occasional game of golf (when I am not reading). My great love is cruising especially to far flung places, when there are long days at sea for plenty more reading! I am really enjoying reviewing books and have found lots of great new authors.

‘Rough Justice’ by Biba Pearce

Published by Mortlake Press,
24 September 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-73854030-3 (PB)

When the dead body of lap dancer Bianca Rubik is found near Waterloo Station in London, police begin to look for a male vagrant who was caught on CCTV near the place she was found.  DC Gareth Trevelyan is handed the case, and his first task is to identify the unknown man.  When two officers show a still image of the possible suspect to Shrap Nelson, another rough sleeper, she recognises his face and agrees to go with them to assist the detective in charge. 

The officers take Shrap to Southwark Police Station unaware that she is a veteran who had served with the Royal Engineers before moving into the Royal Military Police.  During her time in the army, Shrap frequently faced the possibility of injury and capture in hostile environments around the globe.  Her luck ran out when she encountered and was incarcerated by the Taliban.  The gutsy soldier survived and returned to the UK to resume her military duties, but just twelve months later her experiences took their toll.  Diagnosed with PTSD, her career and long-term relationship were destroyed.  For the past two years she has been sleeping and living on London’s streets amongst the homeless, drug addicts, drunks and gangsters.  This comes with its own problems, but it’s the memories of her time in the armed forces that haunt her.

Shrap tells DC Trevelyan that the man in the photo is called Doug and that he’s ex-army.  What she doesn’t confide to the detective is that her fellow veteran had talked her out of taking her own life some months earlier.  When she realises that Doug is a suspect in a murder case, Shrap decides to employ the investigative skills she learned as a Military police officer to prove her friend’s innocence. 

Then Waterloo gives up yet another corpse.  This time it’s Doug, and Trevelyan thinks that the old soldier must have murdered Bianca before he deliberately or accidentally killed himself.  This would be convenient and solve two suspicious deaths in one go, but Shrap isn’t having any of it.  She convinces Trevelyan that there are some anomalies that throw doubt on Doug’s culpability and suddenly the pair find themselves working in tandem.  It’s an unlikely alliance and one that puts them both in danger.

Rough Justice is a fast moving and well plotted crime thriller.  Each chapter is concise, compelling, and carefully constructed.  Violence is sometimes described graphically, yet without ever becoming gratuitous.  Shrap and Gareth both have complicated histories, they are the perfect protagonists as they negotiate the case from very different situations.  London is depicted with realism; the sights, smells and sounds of the city are realistic and a sense of edgy jeopardy lurking just below the surface is palpable.  Brilliant!

Biba Pearce has created a page-turner full of attitude with twists and turns galore.  Highly recommended. 
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Reviewer: Dot Marshall-Gent 

Biba Pearce grew up on the wild eastern coast of Southern Africa. She now lives in Surrey, and when she isn’t writing, can be found rambling through the countryside or kayaking on the river Thames. She writes gritty police procedurals and is the author of the bestselling DCI Rob Miller series published by Joffe Books. She was the winner of Best Crime Fiction at the 2024 National Indie Excellence Awards and was a finalist for the 2024 Feathered Quill Award for Best Mystery Thriller

Website: www.bibapearce.com 

Dot Marshall-Gent worked in the emergency services for twenty years first as a police officer, then as a paramedic and finally as a fire control officer before graduating from King’s College, London as a teacher of English in her mid-forties.  She completed a M.A. in Special and Inclusive Education at the Institute of Education, London and now teaches part-time and writes mainly about educational issues.  Dot sings jazz and country music and plays guitar, banjo and piano as well as being addicted to reading mystery and crime fiction.  

Coming Soon: City of Destruction by Vaseem Kham

 

Published by Hodder & Stoughton.
28 November 2024.

The 5th Book in the Malabar House series

Bombay, 1951. A political rally ends in tragedy when India's first female police detective, Persis Wadia, kills a lone gunman as he attempts to assassinate the divisive new defence minister, a man calling for war with India's new post-Independence neighbours.

With the Malabar House team tasked to hunt down the assassin's co-conspirators - aided by agents from Britain's MI6 security service - Persis is quickly relegated to the sidelines. But then she is given a second case, the burned body of an unidentified white man found on a Bombay beach. As she pursues both investigations - with and without official sanction - she soon finds herself headed to the country's capital, New Delhi, a city where ancient and modern India openly clash.

Meanwhile, Persis's colleague, Scotland Yard criminalist Archie Blackfinch, lies in a hospital fighting for his life as all around him the country tears itself apart in the prelude to war...

Vaseem Khan was born in London in 1973. He studied finance at the London School of Economics. He first saw an elephant lumbering down the middle of the road in 1997 when he arrived in the city of Mumbai, India to work as a management consultant. This surreal sight inspired his Baby Ganesh Agency series of 'gritty cosy crime' novels. His aim with the series is to take readers on a journey to the heart of modern India. He returned to the UK in 2006 and has since worked at University College London for the Department of Security and Crime Science. Elephants are third on his list of passions, first and second being great literature and cricket, not always in that order. His first book The Unexpected Inheritance of Inspector Chopra was a Times Bestseller and an Amazon Best Debut. The second in the series Perplexing Theft of The Jewel in The Crown won the 2017 Shamus Award for Best Original Private Investigator Paperback. His latest book in the Malabar House series is City of Destruction. 

 http://vaseemkhan.com

Twitter: https://twitter.com/VaseemKhanUK
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/VaseemKhanOfficial/

‘Against The Grain’ by Peter Lovesey

Published by Sphere,
14 November 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-4087-3262-5 (HB)

Peter Diamond is feeling even grumpier than usual. His boss, Assistant Chief Constable Georgina Dallymore has been dropping ponderous hints about him approaching the age of retirement, allusions that Diamond is determined to ignore because he feels that his life is defined by his job as a senior police officer. To make matters worse, Diamond’s partner, Paloma, has persuaded him to spend his week’s leave visiting Julie Hargreaves, his second-in-command when he first moved to Bath. Julie has now retired from the police service and has moved to live in Somerset. Diamond protests that he does not like the countryside and cannot leave his elderly cat, Raffles, but a lot of his reluctance is due to his recognition of the unpalatable fact that he had not always treated Julie with the support and respect that she deserved. Paloma thinks that Julie has a reason for wanting them to stay with her and suspects that she wishes to ask Diamond’s advice, so she overrides his objections. Soon Paloma, Diamond and Raffles are bound for rural Somerset.

When Diamond meets Julie again, he is shocked to discover that, in the intervening years, she has become blind. She has accepted her disability with courage and composure and lives an independent life, with the aid of her guide dog, Bella. However, Paloma is right that Julie does want Diamond’s advice about a cold case that happened locally. A few years ago, a man was discovered dead in one of the enormous grain silos on the largest farm in the area. He had been fooled by the apparently firm crust on the grain and when it broke, he had sunk in and suffocated. The victim was Roger Miller, and he had been attending a wild party held by the owner of the house and farm, Claudia Priest. She had set up a competition that involved finding the garter she had hidden somewhere on the farm, with the promise of a personal reward for the winner. Claudia claimed that she had not hidden the garter in the silo and said she had put it in the bull pen, but the court did not believe this and convicted her of manslaughter.

Claudia has served half of her sentence and is due to be released, but Julie believes that Claudia had told the truth about where she had left the garter and is still fretting that Claudia was unfairly treated by the investigating officers and the trial judge. Julie also fears that if Claudia returns to the village, she will be made unwelcome by the hostile villagers, because they hated the noise and disruption of her parties and compared her unfavourably with her late father. Mervyn Priest had been regarded as a benefactor because of his altruism and involvement with village activities.

Diamond wants to set Julia’s mind at rest, and, despite his initial scepticism, he becomes intrigued by what had really occurred during that last fateful party. As Paloma points out, this is his first chance to investigate a traditional village mystery, especially irresistible when the village in question is called Baskerville. Roger Miller had lived in Bath and run his art vendor business there, and two other men who attended the party also reside there, so Diamond takes a daytrip back to Bath, hoping that he doesn’t encounter any of his police colleagues. He has already introduced himself to the village as Peter Dee and he continues with the deception as he contacts two surviving players of the game. He finds it difficult to keep the stories straight that he has to tell to persuade people to talk to him and finds it very different to the direct police method of showing his warrant card and demanding to be told facts. He also misses the support of his highly trained team. Nevertheless, he enjoys the freedom from paperwork, regulations and Georgina’s critical gaze.

Back in Baskerville, Diamond steps out of his comfort zone and, by putting himself on the line in several ways that surprise even Diamond himself, he begins to win the respect and liking of many villagers. He continues to investigate, probing deeply into things that happened long before Miller’s death. On the day of a village celebration, Claudia and all the surviving players in the drama assemble in Baskerville, and Diamond discovers just how dangerous it can be to investigate as a lone operative, without his team to watch his back.

Against the Grain is the twenty-second novel featuring Peter Diamond and, sadly, it is also the last. Like its predecessors it is a superb novel, with excellent characterisation and a fascinating multi-layered plot. Diamond is a grumpy but engaging protagonist who continually surprises by his willingness to get involved, and Paloma is delightful as his loving but clear-sighted partner. Although the title might be interpreted as a reference to the victim’s hideous death in a grain silo, it is also an old carpenter’s saying about the problems of sanding a piece of wood against its grain, which is exactly what Diamond is doing as he teaches himself to investigate in a different, solitary way.

Against the Grain is a compelling and positive farewell to one of the most iconic fictional detectives of the last thirty years. It is a page-turner, which I wholeheartedly recommend. 
.-------
Reviewer: Carol Westron

Peter Lovesey was born in 1936, and attended Hampton Grammar School before going to Reading University to study fine art. He soon switched to English. National Service followed before Peter qualified as a teacher. Having already published The Kings of Distance, named Sports Book of the Year by World Sports, in 1969 he saw a competition offering £1,000 for a first crime novel and decided to enter. Wobble to Death won, and in 1975 Peter became a full-time crime writer, winning awards including the Cartier Diamond Dagger in 2000 in recognition of his career in crime writing. He is most well-known for his Inspector Peter Diamond series. There are twenty one books in the series. 

http://peterlovesey.com  

Carol Westron is a successful author and a Creative Writing teacher.  Her crime novels re set both in contemporary and Victorian times.  Her first book The Terminal Velocity of Cats was published in 2013. Since then, she has since written 8 further mysteries. Carol recently gave an interview to Mystery People. interview

www.carolwestron.com
To read a review of Carol latest book click on the title
Delivering Lazarus