First published in Crime Scene #4
TIME OF TORMENT
BY JOHN CONNOLLY (Hodder & Stoughton). Out Now
Fourteen novels and one novella on, John Connolly’s supernaturally tinged private investigator Charlie Parker – forever helping lost souls at the risk of his own – this time comes up against the Cut, an isolated and inbred community which, for generations, has used fear and occasional violence to keep the rest of the world at bay, and to protect and revenge its own whenever they stray out into the world.
Connolly is prone to use somewhat ornate and poetic vocabulary, as well as the occasional authorial flourishes – “Let us leave Roger Ormsby for now, staring into the empty trunk…” being an all too early example. He also has a tendency to set aside an entire chapter to fill in the back story of a character once they’ve been first introduced, pausing the action as a result. If that lacks realism, Connolly nevertheless uses the technique effectively to make you care about the people concerned.
While certainly a slow burner in terms of plot – for example, Parker doesn’t even become aware of the Cut for about a third of the novel – Connolly provides plenty of tension and a genuinely creepy atmosphere that keeps you turning the page to find out what happens next.
DID YOU KNOW?
While authors Ross Macdonald and James Lee Burke are his adult inspiration, the first writer John Connolly read “unassisted” as a child was Enid Blyton.
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FOLLOW THE MONEY S1
(Nordic Noir & Beyond) Out Now
Follow the Money certainly comes with Nordic Noir credentials: creator Jeppe Gjervig Gram co-wrote Borgen, executive producer Anders Toft Andersen worked on The Killing and The Bridge. Together they attempt to prove that the boardroom is just as promising ground for crime as the dark streets – and they almost succeed.
Beautiful cinematography by the likes of Jonas Alarik, Niels Reedtz Johansen and Eric Kress certainly helps; the contrasting worlds of low-street criminality and bright, open plan offices are clearly delineated. Admittedly, Per Fly – who directs the opening two episodes – is arguably too fond of on-screen darkness for his own good, but perhaps he was just told to ensure this looked like Nordic Noir?
A solid, reliable cast – Thomas Bo Larsen as the determined detective, Natalie Madueño as the young lawyer who gets too close to Nikolaj Lie Kass’s suave CEO – certainly do the business, but there’s an earnest arrogance to the writing that doesn’t entirely excuse its underwritten characters and a plot that’s just too slow a slow-burner to fully combust.
DID YOU KNOW?
Despite a 25 year career playing people on the wrong side of the law, Thomas Bo Larsen has always wanted to play a police officer.
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DIE OF SHAME
BY MARK BILLINGHAM • (Little, Brown) Out Now
After recovering addict Heather Finlay’s is found dead, DI Nicola Tanner quickly decides that her killer is most likely to be a member of the small counselling support group she used to attend: a supposedly “safe place” in which she and four others – a disparate group “that nobody could have mistaken… for a group of close friends. Even work colleagues would be a stretch” – were encouraged by therapist Tony De Silva to shared their deepest secrets, fears and shame. Tanner’s investigation is hampered, however, by not just the strict confidentiality binding the group and therapist together, but also the tendency towards denial and deception that can characterise those dealing with addiction.
An interesting aspect of Mark Billingham’s latest novel is that it follows two intertwined timelines: successive chapters titled “…Now” follow Tanner’s methodical but inconclusive investigation, following the discovery of Heather’s three-weeks old corpse; meantime, much of the narrative background, including details of what happens within and beyond the group’s circle of chairs in De Silva’s conservatory, are delivered through the “…Then” chapters interspersed throughout the novel. In one respect, this means that the reader regularly learns much more detail about the case than the methodical, always-keeping-up-with-her-paperwork Tanner does, although Billingham seldom lets the reader get too far ahead.
Admittedly, on a few occasions, Billingham does quite blatantly withhold information for his reader, simply in order to guarantee his big reveal of the murderer. An example: he always uses a gender-neutral pronoun when referring to an otherwise non-described character (a mysterious prison visitor whose relevance to the overall plot only becomes clear towards the end). Another: when, at one point, De Silva explains to a professional colleague what happens at a particular session, all the reader gets from their supposed point of view character (at that point at least) is: “So, Tony told him,” along with a few teases about a confession being “a notch or two about what the others had come up with”. Billingham presumably hopes to pique the reader’s interest in what’s to come, but the way he does it feels a tad annoying; surely the anticipation could have been encouraged in an altogether less overtly mechanistic way?
On the whole, though, this is a gripping, character-based story that keeps its police procedural low-key and relies on the believability of its characters to hold the reader’s interest.
DID YOU KNOW?
Billingham’s earliest TV writing credit was on CBBC hit show Maid Marian and Her Merry Men, in which he played dim-but-lovable guard Gary.
NOW READ
The Witness by Simon Kernick; a gripping new race-against-time thriller – populated by the author’s trademark cheerful amoral characters and introducing DI Ray Mason.
