CTG Reviews: TELL NO TALES by Eva Dolan. TELL NO TALES cover image What the blurb says: “The car that ploughs into the bus stop early one morning leaves a trail of death and destruction behind it.
DS Ferreira and DI Zigic are called in from the Peterborough Hate Crimes Unit to handle the investigation but with another major case on their hands, one with disturbing Neo-Nazi overtones, they are relieved when there seems to be an obvious suspect. But the case isn’t that simple and with tensions erupting in the town, leading to more violence, the media are soon hounding them for answers. Ferreira believes that local politician Richard Stotton, head of a recently established ring-wing party, must be involved somehow. Journalists have been quick to acclaim Stotton, with his Brazilian wife and RAF career, as a serious contender for a major political career, despite his extremist views, but is his party a cover for something far more dangerous?” What I especially liked about this novel was the characterisation. Highly recommended. THE WIND IS NOT A RIVER by Brian Payton. John Easley, a reporter for the National Geographic is ejected – along with every other journalist in the region – from the Aleutian Islands when the Japanese make their first incursion onto American soil.
When his brother, a Royal Canadian Air Force pilot, is later shot down over the English Channel, John’s grief leads him to the decision that the people of America deserve to know the truth about what is happening in the Aleutians. Sneaking into Alaska and thence onto the archipelago, John finds himself stranded on the island of Attu when the plane he is on is shot down by the occupying forces. Given the choice between survival in this barren land or torture at the hands of the Chinese, John decides to take his chance with the elements.
Back in his home town of Seattle, his wife, Helen, is beginning to worry about his silence, and about their parting words on the night he left to return to Alaska. "You’ll be attracting plenty of attention," Cooper observes [to John's wife, Helen]. A TAP ON THE WINDOW by Linwood Barclay. Heading home from an out-of-town job on a wet and miserable night, Cal Weaver stops at a red light close to Griffon, New York’s local hangout spot.
When a teenage girl taps on his window and asks for a lift, Cal knows it’s the height of stupidity, but the fact that the girl recognises him as "Scott’s father" causes him to renege. In the darkness, he can’t see much, but he does notice the scratch on the back of her left hand. Claiming to feel ill, the girl asks Cal to pull into the nearby fast food restaurant. When she gets back into the car, the scratch is gone, the original girl replaced by someone new. THE SHINING by Stephen King. It came as no surprise when this month’s Hodderscape Review Project title dropped through the letterbox and turned out to be Stephen King’s classic novel, The Shining.
With this month seeing Hodder & Stoughton publish the book’s highly-anticipated (by me!) Sequel, Doctor Sleep, it was the obvious book to get us all in the mood. I may have mentioned before that I’m a big fan of King, so it was with great joy that I dived in, happy to have an excuse to re-read one of his early books. Jack Torrance thought: Officious little prick. Jack Torrance is a dry alcoholic with a temper problem. ‘You got a knack,’ Hallorann said, turning to him. Like many people of my generation, my first experience of Stephen King’s The Shining was actually Stanley Kubrick’s vision of the novel. REVIVER by Seth Patrick. "Sometimes Jonah Miller hated talking to the dead.
" Jonah Miller is a reviver. As part of the Forensic Revival Service, his job is to bring the recent dead back to life – briefly – to obtain a witness statement from them concerning the circumstances of their death. When one of his subjects grows frightened of something that seems to be stalking her, and that thing then talks to Jonah, he finds himself on administrative leave due to stress-induced hallucinations. After further revivals, Jonah finds himself accessing memories that are not his own, and quickly learns that he is not the first reviver to have suffered these symptoms. As he digs, he discovers that someone – most likely someone with a lot of financial backing – is using revival for their own sinister ends, leaving it up to him – and the dwindling group of people that still trust in his sanity – to stop them before what they’re doing can have dire consequences for humankind.
THE JACKAL’S SHARE by Chris Morgan Jones. Iranian billionaire Darius Qazai is heading for retirement.
When an attempt to sell portions of his business result in a report linking him with art smuggling, he hires Ikertu Consulting to dig into his past and prove that he has nothing to hide. Assigned to the case, Ben Webster takes an instant dislike to the man. THE SHINING GIRLS by Lauren Beukes. When Harper Curtis murders an old woman, he finds the key to a house to which he instinctively knows the way.
In the bedroom of the house he finds the names of girls scratched on the walls next to mementoes and trophies, threads linking them together in an intricate web. Harper is a murderer, and these are his shining girls, spread across time, awaiting his visit. Kirby Mazrachi is one of these girls, the only one to survive Harper’s attack. MAYHEM by Sarah Pinborough. It is October 1888 and the people of London are already reeling from the series of murders committed by the man who has styled himself “Jack the Ripper”.
When the rotting torso of a young woman is found in the vault of the building site that will eventually become New Scotland Yard, the immediate assumption is that it belongs to yet another victim of the Ripper. But police surgeon Dr Thomas Bond doesn’t agree – this is a much colder killer, without the fiery passion that defines Jack’s kills. As more body parts – from this victim and others – wash up on the banks of the Thames, panic sets in across the metropolis and Bond finds himself joining forces with a mysterious Italian Jesuit and an unwashed immigrant with an unwanted “gift” in an attempt to find and stop this new killer.
For the first half of the novel, Mayhem reads like a straightforward mystery novel with more than a little influence from Conan Doyle. Mayhem is the first in a series of books featuring Dr Bond. Like this: GUN MACHINE by Warren Ellis. On playing back the 911 recording, it’d seem that Mrs.
Stegman was more concerned that the man outside her apartment door was naked than that he had a big shotgun. John Tallow is a New York City detective, riding on the coattails of his much more popular partner. When they respond to a 911 call concerning a man with a shotgun, both Tallow’s partner and the naked man end up dead, and Tallow stumbles across the strangest thing he has ever seen: one of the apartments in the building the naked man has been terrorising is full of guns, arranged on the walls and floor in seemingly deliberate patterns. Book notes: Lane, Hancock, Armstrong « Follow the Thread. This time I’m looking at three recent debut novels.
Harriet Lane, Alys, Always (2012) Life is not particularly going anywhere for Frances Thorpe – a sub-editor on the literary desk of a London newspaper – until she’s driving home one day after visiting her parents, and comes across a crashed car. Pariah by David Jackson. Pariahby David JacksonPublished by Macmillan, March 2011ISBN 9780330530569Buy Pariah from Pan MacmillanBuy Pariah from The Book DepositoryBuy Pariah from Amazon Visit David Jackson's websiteFollow David Jackson on Twitter Pariah is the debut novel from David Jackson. It is written like a Hollywood movie whilst combining the overall feel and structure of hit US crime dramas like CSI, Criminal Minds or Law and Order. So, if you like a good action movie or crime drama, you'll want to give this book a try. A Dark Anatomy by Robin Blake. A Dark Anatomy by Robin Blake It’s been a while since I sat down and read a book based in the 18th century but when I received an advanced copy of Robin Blake’s “A Dark Anatomy” – published by Pan Macmillan – I knew, upon looking at the magnificent and opulent book jacket, I just had to read it!
In fact it made me wonder how many people are swayed by attractive book designs. Review: Scarlett Dedd by Cathy Brett. Scarlett Dedd is one of the first books that I have read in my rediscovery of YA literature, and it was certainly a treat. It is a funny, intelligent, teenage story that is well written, well presented and has an authentic teenage voice in the person of Scarlett. I have written a little synopsis for you: Scarlett is your typical teenager in so many ways, yet she is also quite different, unique.
Like any typical teenager she is unhappy with her family life, though she is sure she has more reasons to be than most, not least due to her surname which has been cause of much ridicule for all her life. A Capital Crime by Laura Wilson. My first introduction to Laura Wilson, “A Capital Crime” is one of the most intriguing books I’ve had the pleasure to read this year. Set in the early 1950’s and based on the notoriously tragic true story of Timothy John Evans and John Reginald Halliday Christie, Wilson blends fact and fiction with consummate ease producing a rather beguiling novel.
A Capital Crime by Laura Wilson Timothy John Davies, a semi-literate van driver, walks in to the Merthyr Tydfil police station (in Wales) and admits to murdering his wife and 14 month old daughter. The Lazarus Vault by Tom Harper. John Grisham “The Confession” John Grisham's "The Confession" Since I began reviewing books earnestly in early August, I can count on one hand the books that have caused me to lose valuable beauty sleep (and I mean valuable!) Dark Matter by Michelle Paver. Judgement & Wrath (Joe Hunter #2) Book Review. Never Look Away by Linwood Barclay.
The Priest by Gerard O’Donovan. Heresy by SJ Parris. Dark Matter by Michelle Paver. The Sacred Vault by Andy McDermott. The Snowman by Jo Nesbo. Dark Matter by Michelle Paver. The Last 10 Seconds by Simon Kernick.
The Sex Club by L.J. Sellers. The Sex Club by L.J. Sellers I have to admit, this book surprised me! I am rather passionate about American Crime Fiction and when “The Sex Club” by L.J. Sellers arrived I attacked it with gusto, uncertain of what I’d find between the covers – I certainly wasn’t disappointed. Doctor Who: The Only Good Dalek – book review. Full Dark, No Stars by Stephen King. John Grisham “The Confession” Epitaph by Shaun Hutson – Book review. No Mercy by John Gilstrap – ebook review. A Simples Life:My life and times of Aleksandr Orlov. The Priest by Gerard O’Donovan. The Snowman by Jo Nesbo. The Killing Place by Tess Gerritsen. The Anatomy of Ghosts by Andrew Taylor – book review. “So cold the river” by Michael Koryta – book review. Book Review “Our Kind of Traitor” by John Le Carré. The Reversal by Michael Connelly (book review)
Red Wolf by Liza Marklund (Book Review) The Cold Kiss by John Rector. Beneath Hill 60 by Will Davies. “Captured” by Neil Cross. Blacklands by Belinda Bauer – book review.