Dark in the title and dark in mood as a convicted kidnapper/rapist is resettled in Aberdeen after serving his prison time. DS Logan McRae is one of the reluctant coppers assigned to keep the man safe. Little does he know that the pitchfork-waving mob isn't the only danger and that the criminal past of the bible-reading pervert will threaten the health of more than the one who deserves it.
As a sub-plot we have Edinburgh heavies moving in, crooked property developers (and Donald Trump, not crooked, of course, up yours lawyers), Logan's getting a bit out of his depth with Wee Hamish Mowat - and Hamish's preferred depth for those who annoy him is six feet under.
Alongside MacRae's usual broad canvas of Aberdeen rain and pain he shows several smaller, gloomier scenes, well-described to lend contrast to the work, and all the better for it.
The book stands alone but I'd recommend you read one or two of the earlier Logan McRae novels first.
Showing posts with label novels. Show all posts
Showing posts with label novels. Show all posts
Monday, 29 November 2010
Thursday, 25 November 2010
Stuart MacBride: Broken Skin
Second in the series of Logan McRae novels, and maintaining the high standard of the first, Broken Skin is another romp through Aberdeen's lowlives and a distressing insight into the alcohol and deep-fried diet of the granite city's plods.
The two main strands of this novel are the attempt to capture a serial rapist and the search for a murderer with more interest in leather goods and marital aids than is good for you. As the victim found out. For the former we already have a strong candidate - unfortunately he's a star footballer with a sly lawyer and a high degree of cunning. Logan's now live-in girlfriend, WPC Ballbreaker Watson, is after chummy and there's a strong feeling that if she can't get her man she'll at least get his soft squidgy bits.
As to the hunt for the murderer, the denouement will have you both snorting with laughter and curling your toes. A tour de force scene for the wonderful DI Steel (she's the half-insane, chainsmoking, bacon-sarnie munching lesbian), it ends with a constable who'll never eat sliced bread again - I won't say any more lest I spoil the scene.
Throw in an eight year old who exhibits the savagery craved by a Daily Mail headline writer (knife child murders war hero) to keep DS McRae busy, plus a few more police matters to keep him from the pub, and you have yet another great read from Stuart MacBride. You can read this without having seen the first novel (though perhaps better to have read Cold Granite); if you do I can guarantee that you'll be searching out that and the rest of the series.
The two main strands of this novel are the attempt to capture a serial rapist and the search for a murderer with more interest in leather goods and marital aids than is good for you. As the victim found out. For the former we already have a strong candidate - unfortunately he's a star footballer with a sly lawyer and a high degree of cunning. Logan's now live-in girlfriend, WPC Ballbreaker Watson, is after chummy and there's a strong feeling that if she can't get her man she'll at least get his soft squidgy bits.
As to the hunt for the murderer, the denouement will have you both snorting with laughter and curling your toes. A tour de force scene for the wonderful DI Steel (she's the half-insane, chainsmoking, bacon-sarnie munching lesbian), it ends with a constable who'll never eat sliced bread again - I won't say any more lest I spoil the scene.
Throw in an eight year old who exhibits the savagery craved by a Daily Mail headline writer (knife child murders war hero) to keep DS McRae busy, plus a few more police matters to keep him from the pub, and you have yet another great read from Stuart MacBride. You can read this without having seen the first novel (though perhaps better to have read Cold Granite); if you do I can guarantee that you'll be searching out that and the rest of the series.
Wednesday, 3 November 2010
Books and authors: book reviews, author reviews
Having just knocked over a pile of books (again) and as the collection spills out onto a communal landing, I've begun to realise that I own a few books more than the average person. I've begun to understand why friends mutter about opening a second hand bookshop or make clever comments about Sefton council not having closed all its libraries then ...
It's not my fault though: people keep writing books, people keep selling them - someone has to buy them, if only to oil the wheels of creativity and commerce. And many of them are from libraries, charity shops or (pause for revolting expression) pre-owned. Actually, I blame Amazon for making it too easy to grab a few novels; much like supermarket cakes which don't count in the diet if they're reduced, so Amazon's special offers lure you into a short session of comfort shopping. Before you know it there are nine paperbacks on the floor and a pile of squidgy plastic to mock your green credentials.
"That child always has his nose in a book." True, once upon a time, though I long ago graduated from Biggles. (I still remember him, Ginger and Algy doing dashing deeds in the war and then, as peacetime police, spotting reefer fields in Cornwall - spoilsports.) I've also realised that there are several activities that are vastly improved with a good book; bubble baths, television, lazing, pre-bedtime relaxing, travel. That's not to deny that there are activites where mixing with reading is a bad idea, as girlfriends and fellow footballers will testify. Vehemently. Painfully.
So then, I read voraciously and must feed the maw with ever new supplies. How do I find new books, new authors? Book reviews in newspapers tend to be over-literary and incestuous as "critics" praise each other's efforts. Book reviews on sellers' sites are a mixed bag, often surprisingly badly written: if you can't write a few grammatically-correct sentences, what does that say for the written work you're talking about?
I'm fortunate in having an independent bookstore nearby (Pritchard's, Crosby) but they can't stock everything and the assistants can't read everything to advise.
One favourite way of buying books is finding a good charity shop and whizzing along the racks, dodging little old ladies after Dick Francis and not making eye contact with other shoppers looking at garish green dresses. And they're usually men in cord trousers :) Grab a book, scan the blurb, read a few paragraphs at random, look at the cover review quotations. If the main comment is from the evening paper from a town of less than 20,000 population, put back on shelf and move on.
Even with these precautions though, success is sadly mixed. For every ripping yarn I find, I walk out with a promising effort that transmogrifies on the way home into a tale of a rabid right-winger killing commies and foreigners to make the world safe for him and a bevy of lithe but submissive beauties. I'm cursed to read such efforts as I'm unable to leave a book partially read. All I can do is pass the grudgingly-finished book back to the shop and hope that it doesn't find another mug like me.
If only there were sites where I could read reviews of books and authors written by people like me ... If only I could reach out and find such people ... If only I got off my backside (not literally as I sit down to type) and put out a few such reviews myself, and then I might get feedback, comments, recommendations!
Right, time to start a blog about the books I've read and enjoyed. Lurking on the Web there must be many who like Stuart MacBride , Andrew Vaachs, George MacDonald Fraser and Ross Thomas. Or who might enjoy discovering them perhaps. People who've read about her with the dragon tattoo and are looking to branch out. There's great pleasure to be found in passing on a book when the recipient comes back a few days later, raving about it, so let's see if some reviews here can do that virtually. Coming soon, then, and hopefully in ever-increasing numbers, my reviews of books and authors. Mainly novels, though various writers will creep in as and when I remember them or, perhaps even better, discover them. If just a few people find pleasure from reading something I've recommended then the world will be a better place. And by god it needs it :)
Your comments are welcomed: I'd love to chat with you and hear your book reviews and thoughts. Sadly we can't do it over coffee and cake but the thought is there at least.
A bit of fun for you: go and have a heated debate about which five books you'd choose: Five Favourite Books For A Desert Island
Completely off topic, but a cool tool, and probably of interest to many bloggers: check your ranking by keywords on major search engines (free).
Going for a wider range of reviewed material than I, Bookgasm blog
A professional blog: David Montgomery's Crime Fiction Dossier though sadly he tells me he's no longer blogging.
A very good and stylish blog by an enthusiastic reader: For lovers of good coffee, good food & good books
A geographically wide-ranging crime fiction blog: Euro Crime
And a hilarious post and comments after a review: Author shoots self in foot. Then reloads and does it again.
Something else I've been looking at recently: Squidoo -- a social networking site where you create pages (known as lenses) and can raise money for yourself and for charity. I've been letting my creative juices flow -- please visit some of my lenses:
Earning money online in safety
Five Internet Gurus
Joni Mitchell, my ten favourite albums
Top tens for various bands on iTunes
Valentines Day: A guide for men buying for women
Valentines Day: A guide for women buying for men
A Sixties day out and a ferry across the Mersey to New Brighton
And one that may be of value to fellow bloggers: Common English Errors - helping online writers find and fix common mistakes.
A quick exercise: someone asked me to recommend a few Poirot books but I'm not a fan of Agatha Christie so I just knocked up a list of all the full-length Hercule Poirot stories
It's not my fault though: people keep writing books, people keep selling them - someone has to buy them, if only to oil the wheels of creativity and commerce. And many of them are from libraries, charity shops or (pause for revolting expression) pre-owned. Actually, I blame Amazon for making it too easy to grab a few novels; much like supermarket cakes which don't count in the diet if they're reduced, so Amazon's special offers lure you into a short session of comfort shopping. Before you know it there are nine paperbacks on the floor and a pile of squidgy plastic to mock your green credentials.
"That child always has his nose in a book." True, once upon a time, though I long ago graduated from Biggles. (I still remember him, Ginger and Algy doing dashing deeds in the war and then, as peacetime police, spotting reefer fields in Cornwall - spoilsports.) I've also realised that there are several activities that are vastly improved with a good book; bubble baths, television, lazing, pre-bedtime relaxing, travel. That's not to deny that there are activites where mixing with reading is a bad idea, as girlfriends and fellow footballers will testify. Vehemently. Painfully.
So then, I read voraciously and must feed the maw with ever new supplies. How do I find new books, new authors? Book reviews in newspapers tend to be over-literary and incestuous as "critics" praise each other's efforts. Book reviews on sellers' sites are a mixed bag, often surprisingly badly written: if you can't write a few grammatically-correct sentences, what does that say for the written work you're talking about?
I'm fortunate in having an independent bookstore nearby (Pritchard's, Crosby) but they can't stock everything and the assistants can't read everything to advise.
One favourite way of buying books is finding a good charity shop and whizzing along the racks, dodging little old ladies after Dick Francis and not making eye contact with other shoppers looking at garish green dresses. And they're usually men in cord trousers :) Grab a book, scan the blurb, read a few paragraphs at random, look at the cover review quotations. If the main comment is from the evening paper from a town of less than 20,000 population, put back on shelf and move on.
Even with these precautions though, success is sadly mixed. For every ripping yarn I find, I walk out with a promising effort that transmogrifies on the way home into a tale of a rabid right-winger killing commies and foreigners to make the world safe for him and a bevy of lithe but submissive beauties. I'm cursed to read such efforts as I'm unable to leave a book partially read. All I can do is pass the grudgingly-finished book back to the shop and hope that it doesn't find another mug like me.
If only there were sites where I could read reviews of books and authors written by people like me ... If only I could reach out and find such people ... If only I got off my backside (not literally as I sit down to type) and put out a few such reviews myself, and then I might get feedback, comments, recommendations!
Right, time to start a blog about the books I've read and enjoyed. Lurking on the Web there must be many who like Stuart MacBride , Andrew Vaachs, George MacDonald Fraser and Ross Thomas. Or who might enjoy discovering them perhaps. People who've read about her with the dragon tattoo and are looking to branch out. There's great pleasure to be found in passing on a book when the recipient comes back a few days later, raving about it, so let's see if some reviews here can do that virtually. Coming soon, then, and hopefully in ever-increasing numbers, my reviews of books and authors. Mainly novels, though various writers will creep in as and when I remember them or, perhaps even better, discover them. If just a few people find pleasure from reading something I've recommended then the world will be a better place. And by god it needs it :)
Your comments are welcomed: I'd love to chat with you and hear your book reviews and thoughts. Sadly we can't do it over coffee and cake but the thought is there at least.
A bit of fun for you: go and have a heated debate about which five books you'd choose: Five Favourite Books For A Desert Island
Completely off topic, but a cool tool, and probably of interest to many bloggers: check your ranking by keywords on major search engines (free).
Going for a wider range of reviewed material than I, Bookgasm blog
A professional blog: David Montgomery's Crime Fiction Dossier though sadly he tells me he's no longer blogging.
A very good and stylish blog by an enthusiastic reader: For lovers of good coffee, good food & good books
A geographically wide-ranging crime fiction blog: Euro Crime
And a hilarious post and comments after a review: Author shoots self in foot. Then reloads and does it again.
Something else I've been looking at recently: Squidoo -- a social networking site where you create pages (known as lenses) and can raise money for yourself and for charity. I've been letting my creative juices flow -- please visit some of my lenses:
Earning money online in safety
Five Internet Gurus
Joni Mitchell, my ten favourite albums
Top tens for various bands on iTunes
Valentines Day: A guide for men buying for women
Valentines Day: A guide for women buying for men
A Sixties day out and a ferry across the Mersey to New Brighton
And one that may be of value to fellow bloggers: Common English Errors - helping online writers find and fix common mistakes.
A quick exercise: someone asked me to recommend a few Poirot books but I'm not a fan of Agatha Christie so I just knocked up a list of all the full-length Hercule Poirot stories
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