The Beresford – Will Carver

Just outside the city – any city, every city – is a grand, spacious but affordable apartment building called The Beresford.

There’s a routine at The Beresford.

For Mrs May, every day’s the same: a cup of cold, black coffee in the morning, pruning roses, checking on her tenants, wine, prayer and an afternoon nap. She never leaves the building.

Abe Schwartz also lives at The Beresford. His housemate, Sythe, no longer does. Because Abe just killed him.

In exactly sixty seconds, Blair Conroy will ring the doorbell to her new home and Abe will answer the door. They will become friends. Perhaps lovers.

And, when the time comes for one of them to die, as is always the case at The Beresford, there will be sixty seconds to move the body before the next unknowing soul arrives at the door.

Because nothing changes at The Beresford, until the doorbell rings…

My thanks to Karen at Orenda for my review copy and to Anne Cater at Random Things Blog Tours for the opportunity to host this leg of the blog tour for The Beresford.

I never do this; pleae indulge me for a second. That Cover. Love it. I can happily ignore 99% of book covers without needing to comment but that one’s a cracker. I wonder if Orenda realise they are saving the very best covers for their supernatural stories? Quite right too – a good horror tale needs a suitably grabbable skin wrapped around it.

So a horror story about a house called The Beresford. But not a haunted house story, this book is all about the people who come to live in The Beresford. And those who come to die.

It seems the cycle is inevitable. A new resident will arrive to stay in The Beresford exactly sixty seconds after the last breath of life leaves one of the current occupants. In that sixty seconds a body has to be hidden and Mrs May (the owner of The Beresford) will come out from her room and introduce herself to the new resident and try to help them settle in.

Mrs May is the old lady at the heart of the story. The enigma. She jokes she is 100, 150, 1200 years old but her residents just see a kindly old woman who is rather set in her ways and appears to be a bit of a matchmaker if her residents are suitability single and lonely.

Nobody arrives at The Beresford with murder in their heart but once they get inside those cheap but surprisingly spacious rooms something changes. A trigger moment will arise and a moment of madness will lead to the next corpse on the floor. The clever ones will cover up their crimes and kindly old Mrs May will just make a few subtle suggestions about “cleaning up”. In some instances Mrs May will need to take direct intervention and tell the murderer how to dispose of a body.

Mrs May knows everything that happens at The Beresford and down the years she has become very adept at body disposal.

What a clever, twisted and entertaining story this was. The constant knowledge someone in the story was going to be killed. Rooting for a favourite or waiting for the irritating ones to be erased but always compelling. There are 1,000 stories which could be told about the people that visit The Beresford and 1,000 more about the people that come looking for them when they are gone. I could have read all 2,000 of them.

This isn’t a scary horror tale in the jump-scare, something’s behind me mould. This is a disturbing story of demonic forces, murder and dismemberment and one for the reader to try to understand what is happening then try to understand how the story could possibly find closure. It’s the best I have read from Will Carver and major kudos to him for delivering such an accessible, readable and utterly enjoyable horror tale.

The Beresford is published by Orenda Books and is available in paperback, digital and audiobook format. You can order a copy here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B08WRMCLVQ/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i0

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July 22

The Murder Box – Olivia Kiernan

At first, Detective Chief Superintendent Frankie Sheehan believes the murder mystery game sent to her office is a birthday gift from one of her colleagues. But when Frankie studies the game’s contents, she notices a striking resemblance between the ‘murder victim’ and missing twenty-two-year-old Lydia Callin.

As Frankie and her team investigate, a series of grisly crimes connected to the game are discovered across Dublin city and Lydia’s involvement with a shadowy network of murder mystery players becomes clear.

On the hunt for Lydia’s murderer, Frankie is drawn more deeply into the game. Every successful move brings her closer to the killer. But the real question is not what happens should she lose — but what happens if she wins.

I received a review copy from the publishers via Netgalley

I haven’t read any of Olivia Kiernan’s previous novels but the blurb for The Murder Box drew me in so I jumped at the chance to read it. Best decision I could have made – it’s a cracker! This is also me exploring a new way to say “you don’t need to have read any of the previous books in the series to enjoy The Murder Box”.

Yes, this is the fourth book to feature Frankie Sheehan but (honestly) let me assure you that not having read the first three will not hinder your enjoyment one iota. I do now face the problem of having to find time to go back and read the first three books now that I know about them, but that is a nice problem to have – I always think that discovering a new (to me) author is one of the outcomes at the end of any book.

In The Murder Box Sheehan takes delivery of a murder game. It arrives for her birthday but she doesn’t know who may have sent it. Sheehan and her colleagues have been overwhelmed with the ongoing investigation into the disappearance of a local celebrity and Frankie hasn’t had much time to consider her birthday and it seems she doesn’t have many friends she would be sharing her day with anyway.

When Sheehan and her partner open the gift box and examine the murder game inside they are initially taken with the idea and, as detectives, they spend a little time contemplating the murder at the heart of the game. There are “clues” in the game which include an earing from the victim, a pathology slide with what appears to be human tissue under the slide and background reading on the “victim” and her last movements before she met her end.

Sheehan is impressed with the detail of the game which arrived in her Murder Box but is too busy to linger on it for long – that is until a woman arrives at the police station to report the disappearance of her flatmate and Frankie thinks she recognises the name of the missing woman. Lydia Callan isn’t just a character created for a role-play game, she seems to be a resident of Dublin and her current whereabouts are unknown.

The Murder Box is a police procedural and a race against time read. I really enjoyed this one and not just beacuse I love reading good murder stories and enjoy gaming too (a happy coincidence). The story is brilliantly paced, the frustration of the police is evident and they are already swamped with work as they try to find their missing celeb while cautiously trying to establish if they have been handed a murder investigation in a gift-wrapped box.

Fun, thrilling and very cleverly constructed. I had several guesses at identifying a murderer and I was wrong each time. It’s great when books do that to me – draw me in, keep me guessing and cleverly fool me. Highly recommended and I want to read more Frankie Sheehan stories now.

The Murder Box is available in hardcover, digital and audiobook format and is published by riverrun. You can order a copy here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0875RYCVX/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i1

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July 21

Mimic (Audiobook) – Daniel Cole

1989: DS Benjamin Chambers and DC Adam Winter are on the trail of a twisted serial killer with a passion for recreating the world’s greatest works of art through the bodies of his victims. But after Chambers almost loses his life, the case goes cold – their killer lying dormant, his collection unfinished.

1996: Jordan Marshall has excelled within the Metropolitan Police Service, fuelled by a loss that defined her teenage years. Obsessed, she manages to obtain new evidence, convincing both Chambers and Winter to revisit the case. However, their resurrected investigation brings about a fresh reign of terror, the team treading a fine line between police officers and vigilantes in their pursuit of a monster far more dangerous and intelligent than any of them had anticipated….

My thanks to Tracy Fenton at Compulsive Readers for the opportunity to join this audiobook blog tour. I received a review copy of Mimic from the publishers through Netgalley.

Mimic is one of the dark ones. A serial killer story with an intense and relentless murderer who is replicating classic sculptures using the bodies of his victims. It was also a fab audiobook listen!

The story begins in 1989 as DS Chambers and a young Winters find a body mounted high on a statue in a London Park. The body had been left in plain sight for anyone to find but due to the off-path location and the inclement weather it actually takes some time for the body to be discovered. It’s a confusing and complicated crime scene which initially looks like an obscure suicide but Chambers has suspicions.

Almost immediately the pair are at a second crime scene in a house where a mother and her son are found posed in the style of a classic sculpture. Although both men are convinced both events are connected their boss is less confident and tells them to treat each death as an isolated incident. There is NO connection and Chambers and Winters are over-reaching to make something from random events.

The good news for readers (listeners) is that Chambers is adamant he is correct and continues to follow his instincts and look for connections between the two deaths. Winters and Chambers identify two potential suspects but lacking official authority they find their investigations cannot proceed unless they are prepared to act beyond their authority.

The pair decide they owe it to the victims to take on both their suspects and try to find the evidence they need to bring a murderer to justice. It doesn’t go well and both men face life changing consequences.

The aftermath of their actions is picked up seven years later. There have been mo more murders but Jordan Marshall has been looking into the cold case which Chambers and Winters had initially worked. The sculpture murderer was never caught and Marshall believes she can help move things forward. She seeks out Chambers and Winters and the three begin to dig deeper. It alerts their target who resumes his murderous mission.

Mimic is a brilliantly plotted and pacy thriller. If serial killer stories are your thing then you absolutely need to read this. The killer feels they have a purpose and a goal they need to fulfill and the police are chasing but cannot get the breaks they need to stop the carnage. It’s the kind of book I love to read and I couldn’t get enough of this one.

As advertised above, this was an audiobook listen for me. Narration duties for this audiobook sit with Jude Owusu and he was a new voice to add to my audio experiences. The most important factor is can the narrator hold my attention – yes, absolutely. Does he give characters distinctive voice? And then some! Listeners get to excperience a terrific range of voices and accents for what was quite a large cast. It gave the extra depth I hope for when I listen to a book and, crucially, Owusu is very listenable.

Mimic is a tension packed listen packed with twists, shocks and red herrings which kept me guessing right to the end of the story. Daniel Cole knows how to spin a captivating tale, this was a highly enjoyable treat.

Mimic is published by Trapeze and is available in digital and audiobook format at present – the Hardback is due to release on August 19th. You can order a copy here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Mimic/dp/B0916D7WXD/ref=sr_1_4?dchild=1&keywords=Daniel+Cole&qid=1626817991&s=audible&sr=1-4

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July 18

The Carpet People (audiobook) – Terry Pratchett

‘In the beginning, there was nothing but endless flatness. Then came the Carpet . . .’

That’s the old story everyone knows and loves (even if they don’t really believe it). But now the Carpet is home to many different tribes and peoples and there’s a new story in the making.

The story of Fray, sweeping a trail of destruction across the Carpet, and two brothers, who set out on an adventure to end all adventures.

I received a review copy of the audiobook from the publishers through Netgalley.

If you ask who my favourite author is then I will tell you (without pause) that Terry Pratchett’s Discworld books are my most loved reading experiences. If I had a shortlist of audiobook narrators then you can bet the house on David Tennant being in the mix. So here we are at The Carpet People. It’s not a Discworld but it IS Pratchett and with David Tennant taking the words and giving them voice we are in dream team territory.

Confession time – I hadn’t read The Carpet People until I started this audiobook. Despite having read “most” of Terry’s books multiple times, I haven’t been so dilligent with the non-Discworld titles so there was extra anticipation for me as I fired up a new book. I was also aware of the background to The Carpet Poeple, written by Pratchett when he was very young and this edition released to mark the 50th anniversary of publication.

There were many elements to the story which made it identifiably Pratchett, the clever word plays on names and incidents. The humour was very much in evidence throughout the story and when you are telling an advanture tale humour so often loses out. It was a real treat to be listening to a “new” Terry Pratchett book after all this time.

But it took me a little while to get into the story and that took the shine off it a little. Initially I struggled to get my head around the key characters and their respective backgrounds. I found some of the gags had slipped by as I was trying to work out who was speaking and I think that, more than once, some of the Pratchett clever word play was lost as I was listening and not seeing the words on a page. I think it took about an hour of listening before it all started to click for me – as the book is aimed at children I am not sure all the kids I know would afford it an hour of their time to decide if they were seeing it through.

Which would be a shame as by the end of The Carpet People I was hooked on the story and enjoying seeing the payoff on the various plot threads the author wove into the tale (poor pun there but I couldn’t resist).

A huge part of my enjoyment did come from the fact David Tennant’s narration was pitched perfectly. Plus you can’t go wrong with a group of argumentative characters who all have Scottish accents, it sounds “right”. As you may expect from a multi-award winning actor the delivery and the emotion was spot on and each new listening session would begin with a big smile on my face as his familiar accent started to feed into my ears.

In brief, a slightly rocky start but those niggles soon left me and I enjoyed the wit, humour and devine story-telling of one of my favourite writers.

One final note – the very last words spoken by David Tennant after the book had ended and the credits had been read out were “Thank You For Listening”. Perfect. Why do all Audiobooks not thank you for listening? Audible just hope you “enjoyed this production”. Can we please have David Tennant thanking us for listening to all audiobooks?

The Carpet People (50th anniversary) is published by Penguin Random House UK Audio

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July 17

Decades: Compiling the Ultimate Library with Derek Farrell

It is a thrill to welcome Derek Farrell back to Grab This Book, particularly as I can welcome Derek in his latest publication week. The new Danny Bird novel, Death at Dukes Halt, released yesterday and the book with accompanying (very cool) merch is available from the Fahrenheit Press website.

Full introduction and purchase links in a second, first a quick introduction to the challenge I set Mr Farrell.

This is Decades. I am inviting book lovers to join me and asking them to help me assemble the best library of books. I began this quest back in January and I had no books on my library shelves. Each week I invite a guest to join me and they are asked to select five of their favourite books to be added to my Ulitmate Library.

Now picking five books is a little too easy so I add a second rule which governs the choices each guest makes. They can only select one book per decade over five consecutive decades. I am told this leads to some angst.

So it is time to hand you over to Derek to introduce his selections. One of my all-time favourite reads is in the mix today, can you guess which?

Derek Farrell is the author of the Danny Bird mysteries ‘Death of a Diva’ ‘Death of a Nobody,’ ‘Death of a Devil,’ ‘Death of an Angel,’ and ‘Death at Dukes Halt,’ as well as the novellas ‘Death of a Sinner,’ and ‘What goes around.’

Derek is married and lives with his husband in West Sussex. They have no cats dogs goats or children, though they do have every Kylie Minogue record ever recorded. Twice.

He can be reached on twitter @derekifarrell or via his website www.derekfarrell.co.uk

His books can be purchased directly from the publisher here https://fahrenheit-press.myshopify.com/search?type=product&q=derek+farrell

Or from Amazon here https://www.amazon.co.uk/Derek-Farrell/e/B06XJ9C6XB?ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1&qid=1603393406&sr=8-1

DECADES

Thanks so much for having me on this feature. I’m honoured to have my submissions joining those of so many amazing contributors before me.

I have always loved libraries and in fact my first book ‘Death of a Diva’ was dedicated to my dad, who took me to the library and gave me a universe to play in. Public Libraries are what made it possible for a kid like me to read any- and everything I wanted, to find the stuff I loved, and to dream of being a writer.

But it was my dad who showed me that reading is a joyful activity, and should always be joyful. “Read the classics, if you want to,” he told me once. “Or don’t, if you don’t want to. The key thing is to love what you read.”

My choices are below, and I hope they inspire some of your readers to find some new loves.

60s – The Jewel in the Skull by Michael Moorcock (1967)

What’s it about: In a post-nuclear holocaust future, where science and sorcery co-exist. the Dark Empire of Granbretan  is expanding across Europe. Baron Meliadus, an emissary of the empire, is sent to the castle of Count Brass to try to persuade him to side with the empire against the other European courts. While in the castle, he begins to court the Count’s daughter, Yisselda, but she refuses to elope with him. Meliadus attempts to kidnap her, but is defeated by Count Brass and swears an oath on the legendary Runestaff to gain power over Count Brass, gain Yisselda and destroy their lands.

In order to achieve these ends, he sends a newly-captured Rebel – Duke Dorian Hawkmoon Von Koln – to the castle, and to ensure Hawkmoon does not betray him, he uses dark sorcery to embed a black jewel in the middle of Hawkmoon’s skull, the jewel acting as a camera that will transmit everything Hawkmoon sees and hears back to Meliadus…

Why it should be in the Library: I discovered these books in the early 80s, having never been much of a sci-fi or fantasy fan. I’m still not a huge reader of those genres, but I spent a summer reading this seies (“The High History of the Runestaff”). The stories, the characters and the feeling of just HAVING to know what happens next, has never left me. This book taught me that regardless of genre, a great story is a great story, and these are great great stories.

70s – Curtain by Agatha Christie (1975 – or was it?)

What’s it about? The novel features Hercule Poirot and Arthur Hastings in their final appearances in Christie’s works. It is a country house novel, with all the characters and the murder set in one house. Not only does the novel return the characters to the setting of her first, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, but it reunites Poirot and Hastings, who last appeared together in Dumb Witness in 1937 as they hunt for a serial killer who has already gotten away with murder five times. But this time, Porot is determined that justice will be served.

Christie actually wrote this book in the middle of the Blitz as bombs rained down around her. A sign of how deeply a writer can become enmeshed with their characters is that instead of worrying about her own safety, she began to worry about what would happen to Poirot if she were to be killed in a bombing.

So she wrote the final Poirot novel, which was delivered with instructions that it was to be published only after she had died. The manuscript was then then kept in a safe (with a copy in a similar safe at her New York publishers) for over thirty years.

Why Should it be in the Library? Because whatever your feelings about Christie’s work, her impact on the crime genre is unarguable, and Curtain is a wonderful mystery novel, the clues woven seamlessly through an admittedly somewhat contrived scenario. Poirot has always been an old man, but here he’s close to decrepit, wheelchair-bound at times, and raging at the cruelty of time that can decay a body but leave his little grey cells as vital as they ever were. Plus, the ending <no spoilers> is a genuine GASP moment that stays with anyone who knows Poirot long after the book.

80s – Blue Heaven by Joe Keenan (1988)

What’s it about? Philip Cavanaugh is surprised to hear that his best friend Gilbert is engaged to be married to Moira. There are two reasons for his surprise: Gilbert loathes Moira with every fibre of his being. But more importantly, Gilbert is flamingly gay.

Gilbert finally confides in Phillip that the entire marriage is a sham designed to maximise the cash gifts from the family of his new Italian-American stepfather, and by the time the trio realise that said family are the Mafia, and that their little attempted fraud may well end up with the three of them wearing concrete overcoats and taking a dip in the East River, they are in too deep to walk away.

Joe Keenan wrote three novels featuring Gilbert and Phillip as well as a rather sweet Broadway musical before becoming a writer and Executive Producer for Fraser and working on Desperate Housewives and Glee.

Why Should it be in the Library? Because it’s quite simply one of the funniest and best plotted / paced / written books of all time. I read it they year it was first published and it has never been off my bookshelves since.

90s – The Burglar in the Library (1997)

What’s it about? For Bernie Rhodenbarr, bookseller and compulsive burglar, a weekend at a country bed & breakfast inn takes an unexpected twist when a valuable book is stolen and dead body turns up in the library.

Why Should it be in the Library? In the early 2000s I attended a crime fiction course at City Lit in London. On the first night we each had to declare our favourite crime writer. I, of course, made my case for Agatha Christie. But a woman who would eventually become a dear friend and mentor to me talked about this guy called Lawrence Block – an American who had written dozens of books and won dozens of prizes. Block’s not James Joyce. His career was not built on groundbreaking origination, but on consistently and conscientiously producing excellent work within a genre he clearly loves. This has to necessitate, at times, playing with the tropes of that genre, and here we find Bernie in basically a Golden Age country house mystery. Every character is not only a suspect, but suspicious; everyone has both a motive and an alibi; and circumstances conspire to ensure that the murderer must be one of the people trapped in the inn.

Block is normally recognised for his darker Matt Scudder novels, but I think that the Bernie the Burglar books more openly reflect his sheer joy in the genre. This one’s playful but fiendishly well plotted, and I’m putting this one in to the library because it’s a book that has given me much joy by a writer whose work I admire greatly. And really, if you can’t love the books in your library, what’s the point in having a library?

00s – The Lost Army of Cambyses by Paul Sussman (2002)

What’s it about? 523 BC: the Persian pharaoh Cambyses dispatches an army across Egypt’s western desert to destroy the oracle at Siwa. Legend has it that somewhere in the middle of the Great Dune Sea his army is overwhelmed by a sandstorm and lost forever.

Two and a half millennia later, a mutilated corpse is washed up on the banks of the Nile at Luxor, an antiques dealer is savagely murdered in Cairo, and a British archaeologist is found dead at the ancient necropolis of Saqqara.

The incidents appear unconnected, but Inspector Yusuf Khalifa of the Luxor police is not so sure.

And so he begins an investigation that will lead him into the forbidding, barren heart of the western desert, and the answer to one of the greatest mysteries of the ancient world…

Why Should it be in the Library? Because it’s a brilliant thriller nobody’s ever heard of from a writer who was taken from us tragically early. Paul Sussman was an archaeologist, a journalist and an author whose Middle-Eastern set thrillers mixed high octane page turners with genuine humanity, and confronted the heart-breaking complexities of the region while never losing sight of their primary function: To keep you turning those pages.

He died of a ruptured aneyurism just weeks before his 46th birthday, and days before his final novel “The Labyrinth of Osiris” was published. That book, in particular, is one of the best and most heartbreaking thrillers I’ve ever read.

Sussman’s work is pacy, tight, thrilling, and human. It carries a vast amount of historical research so lightly that the reader doesn’t even know how much they’re learning as they read these hugely enjoyable books. And his tragically early death is a reminder to each and every one of us to strive every day to live the best life possible, and to write the best book we possibly can.

Huge thanks to Derek for adding a great mix of titles to my Library. I know each week someone’s TBR grows thanks to the recommendations of my guests – I hope that you will also add Death at Dukes Halt to your shopping this week.

DECADES WILL RETURN

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July 9

Decades: Compiling the Ultimate Library with Neil Lancaster

This week I am delighted to introduce Neil Lancaster who has kindly agreed to take on my Decades challenge. In what could almost be considered a bit of careful planning, Neil is the first of two back-to-back guests who are making their decades selections in publication week of their new novel. This gives you six days to get your pre-order placed for Neil’s terrific thriller Dead Man’s Grave and a full week to work out who next week’s guest could possibly be!

If you haven’t come across my Decades challenge yet then let me explain what I asked Neil to help with. I am trying to build a new library of the very best books but started with nothing on the shelves. Each week since January I have been joined by a guest (authors, bloggers, journalists and publishers) and I ask them to help me fill the Library shelves by nominating their favourite reads. But each guest must follow two rules:

1 – Select ANY five books
2 – My guests may only choose one book per decade over five consecutive decades.

I shall leave you in Neil’s capable hands…

Neil Lancaster is the No.1 Audible bestselling author of the Tom Novak series. He has served in the RAF as a Military Policeman, in the UK, Germany, Cyprus and the Falkland Islands. He has worked for the Metropolitan Police as a Detective, investigating serious crimes in the capital and beyond. As a covert policing specialist, he has used a variety of tactics to obtain evidence against murderers, human traffickers, drug dealers and fraudsters.

He now lives in the Scottish Highlands, writes crime and thriller novels and works as a broadcaster and commentator on true crime documentaries. He is a key expert on two Sky Crime TV series, Meet, Marry, Murder and Made for Murder.

Twitter: www.twitter.com/@neillancaster66
Facebook: www.facebook.com/@NeilLancasterCrime
Website: www.neillancastercrime.co.uk

You can visit Neil’s Amazon page here:

Neil’s new novel Dead Man’s Grave has been included on the 2021 Bloody Scotland MacIlvanney Prize Longlist. It releases in digital format on Thursday 16th July and my review (with a pre-order link) is here: https://grabthisbook.net/?p=5620

DECADES

1950’s My family and Other Animals- Gerald Durrell- 1956

This book means so much to me that I find it hard to explain myself, which for a writer is a bit daft. I first came across this book aged about ten years old when my older sister was doing English Lit for O’ Level. As anyone of a certain age will tell you, this book was a feature on the syllabus for many years, and as a result it is widely loved and loathed in equal measures. I fall very much into the first category. It’s a magical, sunlit tale of the Durrell family’s five-year sojourn to Corfu in the 1930’s during that period between the world wars. My Mum, a real bookworm basically ordered me to read it. Up until this point, my reading had been limited to The Beano, The Dandy and occasionally Sparky, but as soon as I began reading, I was completely transfixed by the tale of the eccentric Durrell family and their life in Corfu. All at once the book was warm, sunlit, funny, intriguing and sometimes heart-rending. I learned from the book just what words on a page could conjure in my young mind. I was instantly transported to pre-war Corfu with the beautifully written descriptions of the landscape, flora and faunae. A magical book that will live with me forever.

1960’s- The Spoilers-Desmond Bagley- 1969

Desmond Bagley. Well, what can I say about him?

It’s pretty clear to me that without this author, I’d never had opened a laptop with the idea of writing a novel. Perhaps not as well known as Alistair Maclean or Len Deighton, Bagley was still a multi-million seller of fast paced thrillers, typical of that era.

This one, The Spoilers is a real knockabout rollercoaster of a thriller. A millionaire businessman’s daughter dies from a heroin overdose. He’s not satisfied, so puts together a team of individuals to take the fight to the heroin importers. A proper boys own tale of daring, risk, adventure and loss. The baddies are REALLY bad, the heroes as disparate as could be imagined. It just grabs you by the lapels and drags you in. Bagley was the master story teller of the thriller that featured an ordinary guy thrust into an extra-ordinary situation. Just a phenomenal book.

1970’s Running blind – Desmond Bagley-1970

My whole #Decades list was constructed around this book, that I maintain is Baglley’s best. I just HAD to have Running Blind in. I have read it more than any other book.

This presented me with an enormous problem, as I could have had a whole list of books just from the 1970’s, but as there are rules, even if there’s only two of them, I had to build my list around Running Blind. Just think of the other 1970’s books I could have included. The Moon’s a Balloon, Legionnaire, most of the Alistair MacLean’s, Deighton, Francis and loads of other Bagley’s, but rules is rules, so here we is.

I first read this book after watching the 1979 dramatisation of the book, which starred Stuart Wilson and George Sewell. I was only 13 at the time, but it had a profound effect on me. The story of a lapsed British intelligence agent forced into one last mission by a corrupt spy boss. He travels to Iceland to complete a simple task, but all is clearly not as it seems and he finds himself at the heart of a conspiracy involving KGB, CIA, double agents, and triple agents. It was just tremendous (look it up on YouTube. My Mum found the book in a charity shop and I devoured it. From that moment on, I was hooked on thrillers, and simply never looked back Bagley was a master craftsman at twists, revelation and pace and no one has influenced my journey as a writer more.

To my mind the opener of Running Blind has never been bettered, so I hope you’ll indulge me.

“To be encumbered with a corpse is to be in a difficult position. True, any doctor, even one just out of medical school, would have been able to diagnose the cause of death. The man had died of heart failure or what the doctors call cardiac arrest. The cause of his heart having stopped pumping blood was that someone had slid a sharp sliver of steel between his ribs just far enough to penetrate the great muscle of the heart and to cause a serious and irreversible leakage of blood so that it stopped beating. Cardiac arrest, as I said.

I wasn’t too anxious to find a doctor because the knife was mine and the hilt had been in my hand when he died. I stood on the open road with the body at my feet and I was scared, so scared that the nausea rose in my throat to choke me. This particular body had been a stranger — I had never seen him before in my life.”

BEAT THAT ! ! !

1980’s Policeman’s Lot- Harry Cole -1981

Harry Cole was a Bermondsey boy born before the war. After brief service in the army, and a time as a stone mason, he joined the Metropolitan Police in the 1950s. After training he was posted to Carter Street Police Station in Bermondsey, South London where he remained for thirty years.

His account of policing London in those decades has never been bettered in my opinion. All at once uproariously funny, touching, and often sad. He knitted together his decades of experiences into a beautifully written collection of disparate stories. I was dead set on joining the Met, and I read this book until it fell to pieces. It should still be required reading for anyone seeking to become a cop. There is more wisdom in those yellowed pages than in any official “how to” manual.

1990’s Killing Floor-Lee Child-1997

What can I say? I simply have loved everything that Lee Child has written. The hook of Reacher is just irresistible. The lone gunman coming into town is always an attractive prospect because of what it represents. Freedom. Reacher has nothing beyond his folding toothbrush, and a desire to travel America, where he just runs into situations that are there for him to solve. He’s what we all would secretly like to be (or so we tell ourselves) as in, free. No ties, no money worries, no washing clothes, no job, just the open road and an innate sense of discovery.

Child is a brilliant storyteller. His prose is lean and spare with no words wasted and Killing Floor is as good, if not better than any of his books. The tale of corrupt cops, murder money and deception. I could prattle on forever here, but we’ve all read it, right?

As long as you can continue to suspend belief that the same shit keeps happening to the same guy, the Reacher series is there forever, and for everyone.

Huge thanks to Neil for taking time to select five new books for my Library. I think this is the first time someone has managed to get two books by one author into their selections (still waiting for someone to do a clean sweep of Stephen King). I am also hugely excited to see Killing Floor appear – if I were to ever make my selections then this could well have been a contender for my own list.

If you want to visit my Library, see all the previous selections and meet the guests who selected each of the books then you can click this handy link: https://grabthisbook.net/?p=5113

DECADES WILL RETURN

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July 6

Dead Man’s Grave – Neil Lancaster

This grave can never be opened.
The head of Scotland’s most powerful crime family is brutally murdered, his body dumped inside an ancient grave in a remote cemetery.

This murder can never be forgotten.
Detectives Max Craigie and Janie Calder arrive at the scene, a small town where everyone has secrets to hide. They soon realise this murder is part of a blood feud between two Scottish families that stretches back to the 1800s. One thing’s for certain: it might be the latest killing, but it won’t be the last…

This killer can never be caught.
As the body count rises, the investigation uncovers large-scale corruption at the heart of the Scottish Police Service. Now Max and Janie must turn against their closest colleagues – to solve a case that could cost them far more than just their lives…

My thanks to Finn Cotton at HQ for the opportunity to read Dead Man’s Grave ahead of publication

Dead Man’s Grave.

This.

Book.

Is.

Brilliant.

I could stop writing at this point, I loved it. But I am going to rave a bit more…

Dead Man’s Grave grabbed me in the opening pages and is still in my thoughts a few weeks after I finished it. Top quality crime fiction with lashings of tension and drama, mysteries and secrets for the reader to discover as they read. There is humour to break up the darker scenes and, despite the very clear presence of the villains of the piece, there are several untrustworthy characters who are hidden from DS Max Craigie. Watching him flush them out into the open is why you will keep those pages turning long into the night.

I mentioned Max Craigie – who he? He is a name you want to watch out for! An officer with Police Scotland and working out of Glasgow he used to work for the Met in London and brings a wealth of experience to his team. And Craigie will need to bring every ounce of that experience to his next investigation as a leading member of one of Scotland’s most powerful crime families has gone missing. His family (the criminals) are prepared to co-operate with the police as they want their father back. But Craigie knows they have their own contacts within the police so everything he knows will soon make its way back. Who can he trust amongst his own colleagues to help him and who is passing information to the crooks?

Working with the capable and quirky Janie Calder the pair make their way North from Glasgow to the wilds of the Scottish Highlands to visit the last place the missing gangster was seen. Their journey is far more successful than he anticipated and their missing person investigation turns into a murder hunt. This isn’t going to be the first murder either as a violent gang are hellbent on avenging a centuries old feud and a family who have no knowledge of recent events are now in grave danger.

The action moves up and down the country and Cragie and Calder discover the corruption in the police runs much deeper than a few informants in each station. Can they shine a light on the perpretators or will their interference prove too costly? Craigie is at risk and as he unknowingly courts death I could not turn the pages fast enough.

Dead Man’s Grave was recently announced on the Longlist for the 2021 McIlvanney Prize, it’s already establishing its credentials as one of the best Scottish crime thrillers of the year. Trust me on this one, you will struggle to find a more gripping read.

Dead Man’s Grave releases digitally on 16 July 2021 and the paperback will be available in September. You can order a copy here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0925KS87N/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i0

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July 3

Decades: Compiling the Ultimate Library with Sara Sheridan

Welcome to the Decades challenge. It didn’t begin life as a challenge but as each week goes by I am becoming increasingly aware of the scale of the task I have started.

In January I asked myself the question “Which books would be added to the Ultimate Library? If I were to build a brand-new Library and start with no books, which titles should I add to the empty shelves to get the very best selection available for the Library visitors?”

I knew this was not something I could undertake alone so I have been inviting authors, bloggers, journalists and publishers to join me and help me decide which books should be added to the Library. Each guest is asked to nominate five of their favourite books to add to my Ultimate Library. But there is a small catch – my guests can only select one book per decade over five consecutive decades.

So while my challenge is to get the best books. My guests have the harder challenge – they have to decide which 50-year span they want to choose from and then work out which book best represents each decade within those 50 years. I am told this is a “frustrating” process.

This week I am delighted to welcome Sara Sheridan to Grab This Book.

Sara Sheridan writes history – both fiction and nonfiction. Her Mirabelle Bevan murder mystery series is set in the 50s and she also writes in the late Georgian/early Victorian period – her latest novel The Fair Botanists is out in August and is an intrigue set in 1820s Edinburgh. She remapped Scotland according to women’s history in Where are the Women. You can find her on twitter @sarasheridan where she posts historical research, writing snippets and ice cream tips. Sara’s own books and reading picks are available on her curated page at: https://uk.bookshop.org/shop/sarasheridan

DECADES

4.50 From Paddington by Agatha Christie 1950s I mean there had to be a Miss Marple, right? Long term role model and Queen of Mystery. Right on brand for me and I’m obsessed with the 50s (among other things)

The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark 1960s I’m so conflicted about Muriel. Gawd. She was unbelievably uncomfortable in her own skin and was super-mean to her son but I love this book, which speaks so much of mid century Edinburgh where I was brought up.

The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison 1970s and a book which racists keep trying to ban. Morrison’s first novel and so ahead of the game. An absolute must-read.

Water Music by TC Boyle 1980s The single most rambunctious, dirty, tough historical novel I’ve read. I recommend this book to everybody who is interested in British culture. It’s all about where we came from.

The Morning Gift by Eva Ibbotson 1990s Never mind the Queen, God Save Eva Ibbotson. All her adult fiction is gorgeous, good hearted and full of love. The. Best.

My thanks to Sara for these fabulous selections. Some new reading for me in these selections and but some old favourites too. The best moments for me are when I first read the five choices my new guests have made and I nod and smile my way down the list. Opening with Agatha Christie got the smile in place from the outset.

You can visit the Decades Library and see all the selections which have been made thus far by clicking here: https://grabthisbook.net/?p=5113

DECADES WILL RETURN

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July 3

Down by the Water – Elle Connel

Seven friends gather at a castle in the Scottish Borders. One last weekend before Georgie’s wedding. Near the castle, through a path in the woods, is a loch. After a few drinks, they head down to the water to take photos. The loch is wild, lonely, and stunningly beautiful. They set their camera to self-timer and take some group shots. Later, looking back at the pictures, they see something impossible.

Behind them, eyes wide, a small, drenched boy emerges from the water.

But none of them saw him, and nobody knows where he went. They’re miles from the nearest town. How did he get there? Where did he go?

As the weekend unravels and terrible secrets come to light, it soon becomes clear that their perfect weekend is turning into a perfect nightmare. They’re desperate to leave – but someone won’t let them.

My thanks to Anne Cater of Random Things Blog Tours for the opportunity to join the Down by the Water tour. I received a review copy from the publishers, Wildfire Books.

A group of university friends are reuniting for a weekend away before one of their number gets married. All the friends are to be be bridesmaids for Georgie, who is essentially the guest of honour, but the trip will bring back the girls bring the girls back to Scotland for a castle getaway and a drunken party. As you can tell from the blurb (above) things are not going to go smoothly.

The problems begin on the train North. Although the friends all met at St Andrews University they now all live back in England and are returning to Scotland as a nod to their time together. This entails a long train journey and the drinking begins on the train. In the night Tessa is woken from her sleep and called to help one of their number (Bea) who has taken drugs and is in a bad state. As the only medic in their midst Tessa is called to assist.

This incident sets the scope of the characters well. All the girls will be drinking through the story, drugs are accepted and enjoyed too and this makes some of their choices and reactions interesting as events unfold. We also learn from an early stage that Tessa is seen as the more practical member of their number, that Bea is more vulnerable and that the friends will close ranks and try to resolve problems internally without seeking outside support. A close group who, despite not seeing each other for a number of years, still revert back to old patterns of friendship.

Interestingly as the story plays out and the friends settle into their remote castle for their weekend retreat we see the power dynamics change. Georgie is the bride to be and the largest personality of the group, Tessa appears the more practical and the peacemaker. But these friends have not seen each other for a number of years and any easy companionship they may have previously had is now altered as their lives changed. Within the group of seven there will be sniping, bitching and outright hostility. They will try to overcome these differences for the sake of harmony over the weekend but the drink and drugs will fuel hosilities and loosen any tongues which may otherwise have been curbed.

Within their party there are secrets and old resentments. Why has Georgie suddenly brought together the university crowd and not any of her friends from work? Why does Bea keep disappearing and what is the book she is reading? Why has Tessa booked such a remote place to gather? Why does the castle’s owner act so strangely around the friends? Then, most shockingly of all, how did none of the girls spot the young boy rising out of the loch behind them as they posed for a group selfie? The chilling vision in their photograph gives all the events a decidely creepy feel.

Elle Connel has done a fantasic job making these “friends” a compelling read. The Amazon listing suggests this book is for readers that enjoyed In A Dark, Dark Wood and The Hunting Party. Having read both those books I can see why they are suggested. The tension from In A Dark, Dark Wood is very much present. The Hunting Party brought together a group of friends who were all extremely unpleasant individuals. While Down by the Water does have a few unpleasant characters their toxicity is nowhere near as bad as The Hunting Party. For me, this makes Down by the Water much more enjoyable to read as I could become more invested in the welfare of the characters and actually care if they were to survive to the end of the book.

Thrillers built around secrets are always a good read. When the reader is learning the secrets at the same time as the characters you can’t help but look for clues as to where the story may be heading. Down by the Water did the slow reveals very well and (no spoilers) by the end of the book you may find your sympathies and frustrations at some of the characters have changed over the course of the story. Very nicely pitched and the pacing and reveals were spot on – I enjoyed this one.

Down by the Water is published by Wildfire and is available in digital format now and in hardback and audio from 8 July 2021. You can get a copy here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B08P4DSRX8/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i0

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June 26

Fragile – Sarah Hilary

Everything she touches breaks . . .

Nell Ballard is a runaway. A former foster child with a dark secret she is desperately trying to keep, all Nell wants is to find a place she can belong.

So when a job comes up at Starling Villas, home to the enigmatic Robin Wilder, she seizes the opportunity with both hands.

But her new lodgings may not be the safe haven that she was hoping for. Her employer lives by a set of rigid rules and she soon sees he is hiding secrets of his own.

But is Nell’s arrival at the Villas really the coincidence it seems? After all, she knows more than most how fragile people can be – and how easily they can be to break . . .

My thanks to Anne Cater at Random Things Blog Tours for the opporunity to host this leg of the Fragile Blog Tour. I was very grateful to recieve a review copy through Netgalley.

I always enjoy reading Sarah Hilary, her Marnie Rome books are among the best police thrillers currently being published and she never shields her characters from the worst experiences. Readers can normally expect a comforting security when reading about recurring characters – the danger happens elsewhere, to other people, leaving our favourite cops free to sweep in and catch the killer or lock up the bad guys. Not so with Sarah Hilary’s books, she is one of the few authors where you do feel the gloves are off and every single person she creates can just as easily be destroyed. The gut-punch twists she works so well into her stories are what bring me back every single time.

Knowing that Fragile was a stand alone novel I started reading with one thought uppermost in my mind – anything could happen here!

Nell was a runaway, living on the streets of London with Joe and the pair of them doing what it took to survive. Then one night Joe vanishes leaving Nell alone. She knows where she saw him last and returns to the street to watch for him. She eventually spots Starling Villas – a tiny doorway in a busy street which leads to the house behind. This is where Joe was last seen, going into this house and Nell is going to find out what happened to him in there. Starling Villas is the main hub of activity for the events unfolding but the history Nell and Joe share are equally relevant to the current events so readers will revisit Nell’s past to understand how she comes to find herself knocking on the door of Starling Villas applying for a job she finds out about by chance.

Nell had been brought up in care. From a very young age she cleaned, cooked, scrubbed, mended and did whatever else was required to appease the woman who was acting as her guardian. On learning the mysterious and enigmatic Robin Wilder needed an assistant in Starling Villas Nell makes herself available as a housekeeper. Her responsibilities are meticulously laid out, her every waking moment appears to be planned and her new employer gives away very little, even to the point of virtually ignorning Nell’s existence. She want’s to investigate the house to look for signs of Joe but so carefully plotted are her responsibilites it is hard to see how this could happen.

The pair have a very strange, controlled existence in Starling Villas but that precision is about to be shattered as Wilder’s wife adds an infusion of chaos to the dynamic. Nell hates her from the outset but also knows that this woman is involved with Joe’s disappearance. Things are about to get intense and with Sarah Hilary pulling the strings there is just no telling where we will end up.

Fragile was a fabulous read. For large parts the story felt out of its time. Starling Villas and the seclusion it brought from the outside world, the role of cook and housekeeper for the young girl who also washes, mends and does the shopping for her master. It had an old-world feel but then a mobile telephone is mentioned and you are brought back to the reality of a modern world but with a strange relationship and cirsumstance within this unusual house and its quirky residents.

I fully understand why Fragile is described as modern gothic The writing is beautiful, the depiction of Starling Villas and Nell’s challenging world were vivid and detailed in my imagination. For large parts of the book I had no idea where events may lead but I was fully caught up in the story and I was there for every step of that journey. Highly recommended.

Fragile is published by Macmillan and is available in hardback, digital and audiobook format. You can order a copy here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B08KQGC527/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i0

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