Dark Fire by C.J. Sansom

May 5, 2015May 5, 20154 Comments

This is the second in CJ Sansom’s Shardlake series set in Tudor England and following the investigations of hunchbacked lawyer Matthew Shardlake. The action in Dark Fire takes place a year or two after the events of the first book, Dissolution, which I loved, but although I would recommend reading the books in order it’s not essential and this is a complete story in itself.

Dark Fire is set during the summer heatwave of 1540 as Henry VIII prepares to cast aside his fourth wife, Anne of Cleves, and marry Catherine Howard. Thomas Cromwell, the man who was instrumental in arranging the marriage to Anne, has fallen out of favour with the King and needs to regain Henry’s trust as quickly as possible. When he witnesses a demonstration of Greek Fire (sometimes called Dark Fire), a legendary Byzantine weapon capable of destroying a ship in minutes, Cromwell thinks he has found the perfect way to impress Henry. The problem is, only a tiny amount of Greek Fire remains and the secret formula to produce more has gone missing.

Meanwhile, Shardlake has been approached by a client, Joseph Wentworth, whose niece, Elizabeth has been arrested for murder. Shardlake is convinced she is innocent, but as the girl refuses to say a word in her own defence it seems that even our hero’s skills as a lawyer will not be enough to save her. At the last minute Cromwell intervenes; Shardlake can have more time to investigate and to attempt to clear Elizabeth’s name – but in return he must help to discover the ancient secrets of Greek Fire, which Cromwell has promised to present to the King in twelve days’ time.

I enjoyed Dark Fire; everything I remembered from the previous book was here again – the thorough research, the atmospheric descriptions and the insights into 16th century society. Where this book is even better than Dissolution, in my opinion, is in the characterisation of Jack Barak, the rough, outspoken young man whom Cromwell chooses to assist Shardlake in his task. Barak and Shardlake are such different personalities, with such different strengths and weaknesses, that they form the perfect partnership. Watching their relationship develop was one of my favourite things about this novel.

The first Shardlake novel, Dissolution, was a murder mystery set almost entirely within the confines of a monastery. Dark Fire has a wider scope, with Shardlake and his new assistant, Barak, embarking on a race around London as they try to locate the ancient formula and prove Elizabeth’s innocence before their time runs out. Their journey takes them from prison cells and taverns to law courts and churches, and along the way they experience the best and the worst Tudor London has to offer: one day Shardlake is attending a ‘sugar banquet’ at the elegant home of the aristocratic Lady Honor, the next Barak is climbing down a well in the middle of the night to look for evidence.

Both of the novel’s central mysteries were intriguing, particularly the Greek Fire one – and both present their own set of difficulties and dangers to Shardlake and Barak. It appears that the Wentworth family (with the exception of Joseph) are more than happy for Elizabeth to take the blame and don’t want outsiders trying to interfere, while the Greek Fire mystery seems to result in death for anyone who gets too close to the truth. The appeal of this book for me, though, was not so much the plot as the wonderful portrayal of Tudor life. I’m pleased that I still have another four Shardlake novels to read, beginning with the third in the series, Sovereign.

Death in Kashmir by M. M. Kaye

February 7, 2015August 15, 201729 Comments

I have always thought of M. M. Kaye as an author of historical novels (such as the wonderful Far Pavilions) and although I was vaguely aware that she had also written a series of mystery novels, I had never really thought about reading them. Now that I’ve read the first one, Death in Kashmir, I will certainly be reading the others. What a great book this is!

Death in Kashmir was first published in 1953, but set a few years earlier in 1947, just as India is about to gain independence from Britain. Our heroine, Sarah Parrish, is attending what will probably be the final meeting of the Ski Club of India at Gulmarg, a resort in the mountains of Kashmir. Sarah is hoping for an enjoyable, relaxing holiday but the first sign of trouble ahead comes when another skier has a fatal accident on the slopes. Another death soon follows the first, but this time, the victim – a young woman called Janet Rushton – was able to share an important secret with Sarah before she died.

Sarah is now certain that neither death was accidental but all she wants is to leave Gulmarg and its secrets behind her and have nothing more to do with the whole business. When the skiing party breaks up she visits her aunt in Peshawar and tries to forget what she has learned. Soon, though, her promise to Janet pulls her back to Kashmir where she finds herself caught up in the mission her friend was working on before her death – and this time, Sarah’s own life could be in danger.

I loved this book from the very beginning. It’s so important that a first chapter pulls you straight into the story and this one did, right from the opening line – “Afterwards Sarah could never be quite sure whether it was the moonlight or that soft, furtive sound that had awakened her”. The rest of the story was equally engrossing: a perfect mixture of mystery, suspense, romance and espionage.

The descriptions of Kashmir are stunning. The first part of the book is set in winter on the snow-covered mountain trails of Gulmarg and later the action moves to the Dal Lake in the summer resort of Srinagar where Sarah takes over the lease on a houseboat that once belonged to Janet. Both of these locations are described beautifully, but Kaye also chooses just the right words and images to create a genuinely eerie and unsettling atmosphere. I found myself literally holding my breath as Sarah wondered who was standing outside the ski lodge in the dark, as she watched an unknown figure disappearing up a staircase and as she listened to footsteps on the boards of her houseboat in the night.

What makes Sarah’s situation even more dangerous is that she’s sure the enemy must be one of the group of skiers who were gathered at Gulmarg – the same group who are all now spending the summer in Srinagar. Who should she trust? The hostile Helen Warrender who makes no secret of her dislike for Sarah? The jovial, good-natured Hugo and his long-suffering wife, Fudge? Timid Meril Forbes and her domineering aunt? Or the handsome, polo-playing Captain Charles Mallory? When the villain was eventually revealed it didn’t come as a complete surprise – but I have to admit I had suspected almost everybody at some point, so one of my guesses was bound to be right!

The book is also interesting from the historical viewpoint, being set just before the end of the British Raj and the transfer of powers back to India. Through the stories of Sarah and the rest of the British community in Kashmir, I thought Kaye had perfectly captured the mood of a group of people who knew that their way of life was about to change forever.

I’m now looking forward to reading the other five Death In… mysteries. I just need to decide which one to read next!

One Good Turn by Kate Atkinson

January 13, 2015January 13, 201512 Comments

After reading Case Histories, the first of Kate Atkinson’s Jackson Brodie novels just before New Year, I was desperate to continue with the series. Luckily, I saw a copy of the second book, One Good Turn (subtitled A Jolly Murder Mystery), on the shelf on my next visit to the library so I didn’t have too long to wait!

Following the events of Case Histories, Jackson Brodie has given up his private investigating, taken his inheritance and is leading a quiet life in the French countryside. At the beginning of One Good Turn, he is visiting Scotland for the Edinburgh Fringe Festival where his girlfriend, Julia, is acting in a new play. On Tuesday, as he waits to enter a comedy venue, Jackson witnesses a road rage incident in which one man attacks another with a baseball bat. Jackson doesn’t want to get involved but it seems that he may have no choice.

Another bystander is crime writer Martin Canning, who intervenes by throwing his laptop at the assailant – and then begins to wish he hadn’t when he is asked to accompany the victim to hospital and stay with him overnight. They say that one good turn deserves another, but Martin’s good turn leads to a chain of bizarre incidents that could almost have come straight out of the pages of one of his own Nina Riley crime novels.

Over the next four days, a complex plot unfolds involving a fraudulent businessman, a mysterious cleaning company, a knife-wielding Russian girl, two teenage shoplifters, an unwelcome guest and an aggressive dog. Jackson can’t help being drawn into the investigations, but as the mystery deepens he finds that he has become both a victim and a suspect.

I had enjoyed Case Histories but I thought this one was even better. It was good to meet Jackson again and to see how his relationship with Julia has developed, but I also think it’s good that Jackson is only one of a large cast of eccentric, colourful characters, each of whom becomes caught up in the whirlwind of events. Atkinson puts so much detail and so much humour into her characterisation that each one feels like a real person – we can laugh at them and with them, but we can understand them and have sympathy for them as well.

In this book, we get to know Gloria Hatter, the bored and disillusioned wife of an unscrupulous businessman in trouble for fraud; police detective Louise Monroe, who is trying to investigate the case while struggling to cope with the behaviour of her teenage son; and my favourite, Martin the crime novelist, a shy, reclusive man still haunted by memories of a disastrous trip to Russia several years earlier. Martin’s Nina Riley mysteries sounded so much fun I kept wishing they really existed!

The one criticism I had of Case Histories – the fact that it dealt with three separate storylines that never really came together – was not a problem with this book, as it’s more of a conventional crime novel in that respect. Characters and events that seemed unrelated at the beginning do eventually begin to overlap and things start to fall into place (comparisons are made throughout the novel to a set of Russian dolls, with one fitting inside the other). I loved the ending too; there was a surprise on the final page that left me questioning everything I’d read about one of the characters!

Now I’m looking forward to reading the third book in the series, When Will There Be Good News?

Case Histories by Kate Atkinson

January 3, 2015January 3, 201524 Comments

My first introduction to Kate Atkinson’s work was Life After Life, which I read in 2013 and loved. I’ve been wanting to read more of her books and knowing that a lot of people speak very highly of her Jackson Brodie novels, I decided to start with the first one in the series, Case Histories.

In Case Histories, private detective Jackson Brodie is investigating three old cases that have remained unresolved for years:

Case History No. 1 – During the summer heatwave of 1970, three-year-old Olivia Land is sleeping in a tent in the garden with her older sister, Amelia. When Amelia wakes up, she finds that Olivia has disappeared without trace.

Case History No. 2 – In 1994, eighteen-year-old Laura Wyre is murdered on her first day working in her father’s office. Her killer has still not been found and no motive for the attack has ever been discovered.

Case History No. 3 – In 1979, Michelle Fletcher is living on an isolated farm with her new husband and baby daughter. Depressed, lonely and finding it hard to cope, an argument with her husband ends in a brutal murder.

The connection between these three stories is Jackson Brodie, who is contacted by family members hoping to have the cases reopened or looked at again. Amelia and Julia Land want to find out what happened to their little sister, Olivia, and whether she could still be alive; Laura’s father, Theo, wants to know who killed his beloved daughter and why; and Shirley Morrison is searching for her sister Michelle’s daughter, with whom she lost contact after the incident which tore their family apart. But Jackson has problems of his own and as he begins to investigate these three very different crimes, he is reminded of a tragedy in his own past and another ‘lost girl’ who disappeared from his life decades earlier.

I loved Case Histories. I know describing a book as unputdownable is a cliché, but it was true in this case – it really is the sort of book where once you start reading, you don’t want to stop until you reach the end. It’s a crime novel I would recommend even to readers who are not really interested in crime fiction because, while the three mysteries are quite interesting, the real strength of the book is in the characterisation. The story is not so much about the crimes themselves as about the effect they had on the people involved and how they have tried (and often failed) to move on from what has happened.

I liked Jackson and am looking forward to meeting him again in the rest of the series, but my favourites in this book were Amelia and Theo. Amelia, who is approaching middle age feeling friendless and unwanted, has invented an imaginary boyfriend to brighten up her non-existent social life, and Theo, for whom his daughter was the centre of his universe, is neglecting his health while he devotes his life to finding her killer, drawing up colour-coded charts of her friends and teachers and making yearly pilgrimages to the scene of her death. Their lives are sad, lonely and tragic, yet Atkinson injects just enough humour into their stories to turn them into characters who are amusing but not ridiculous, flawed but sympathetic.

I also thought the structure of the book was interesting, because the timeline is not entirely linear. We see events from one perspective in one chapter, then in the next chapter we go back several hours, days or weeks to see those same events from another character’s perspective, filling in gaps and adding to our knowledge of what is going on. Two of the case histories – Olivia’s disappearance and Laura’s murder – worked very well alongside each other, but the third one, involving Michelle and her sister, felt disconnected from the others and didn’t work quite as well. I think I had expected all three cases to be much more closely linked than they actually were and I was disappointed that they weren’t.

At the end of the book, after Jackson is sure he’s solved the crimes, there are still more twists to come. We are given enough information throughout the story so that we can guess at what may have happened and work out some parts of the mystery, but the final pieces of the puzzle are withheld from us until the very end.

That’s two Kate Atkinson books read and two enjoyed; now I can’t wait to read the second book in the Jackson Brodie series, One Good Turn.

The Devil in the Marshalsea by Antonia Hodgson

August 6, 2014August 6, 201415 Comments

This is a murder mystery with a difference, being set almost entirely within the confines of an eighteenth century debtors’ prison. Our narrator, Tom Hawkins, is a young man who has rebelled against his clergyman father’s plans for his future and is enjoying himself in London, spending all his money on drinking and gambling. After a big win at the card tables one night, Tom is attacked on his way home and his winnings are stolen, leaving him unable to pay his debts. Taken to the notorious Marshalsea Prison, he is horrified to discover that the last occupant of his cell, Captain Roberts, was murdered. The killer has never been caught, but Tom’s new roommate, the charismatic and mysterious Samuel Fleet, is the man most people believe to be the murderer.

The Marshalea is privately run for profit, so it’s not surprising that the prison governors want the killer identified as quickly as possible to avoid any further scandal. Told that his only chance of being released depends on whether or not he can solve the mystery of Roberts’ death, Tom agrees to investigate. Unsure who can be trusted and beginning to wonder whether such things as truth and justice even exist in a place as corrupt as the Marshalsea, Tom eventually uncovers a web of betrayal and deception on a scale he could never have imagined.

Other authors have written about the Marshalsea, most famously Charles Dickens in Little Dorrit, but Dickens’ Marshalsea was a newer building on a site further down the road; set in 1727, Antonia Hodgson’s novel refers to the original prison. Not knowing anything at all about the Marshalsea, this was quite an eye-opening book for me. I was aware that prisoners were often able to offer bribes in return for better living conditions and privileges, but I hadn’t realised there was such a great disparity between the fate of those who could afford to pay and those who couldn’t.

The prison was divided into two sections. The prisoners who had some money to spend or who had influential friends, lived on the Master’s Side, which was almost like a complete town in itself, with coffee houses, bars, restaurants and even a barber. They had the freedom to move around and in some cases were even given permission to go out into London during the day. For the poor people on the Common Side, things were much worse. Crammed into tiny cells and suffering from starvation, disease and overcrowding, they died at a rate of up to twelve a day. Tom Hawkins, whose best friend happens to work for Sir Philip Meadows, Knight Marshal of the Marshalsea, is lucky enough to find himself on the Master’s Side but with the knowledge that if his luck should run out, he could find himself thrown into the Common Side to meet his death with the others.

This is not a book for the faint-hearted as there are some horrible descriptions of sickness, torture and brutality, not to mention the dirty, squalid conditions the unfortunate inmates of the Common Side were forced to endure. Knowing that this was an experience many people really did have to go through makes it even more horrific. Despite this, I found The Devil in the Marshalsea very entertaining and fun to read. The book is filled with larger than life characters and I was surprised to find, when I read the notes at the end of the book, that many of these people really existed and were mentioned in the diary of John Grano, a debtor who spent a year in the prison from 1728-1729.

As a mystery novel, The Devil in the Marshalsea kept me guessing right until the end. I did not work out who the murderer was and even after the truth was revealed there were still more plot twists and revelations to come. As a work of historical fiction it’s equally impressive; I loved the portrayal of eighteenth century London both inside and outside the Marshalsea. I was so pleased to find that there’s going to be a sequel to this book and I’m already looking forward to meeting Tom Hawkins again!

I received a copy of this book from the publisher for review

A Dark and Twisted Tide by Sharon Bolton

May 15, 2014May 15, 20146 Comments

This is the fourth book in the Lacey Flint series by Sharon (formerly S.J.) Bolton and I’ve been looking forward to it since finishing the third one more than a year ago!

Having been involved in three very traumatic cases in a short space of time (which you can read about in Now You See Me, Dead Scared and Like This, For Ever) Lacey is now living alone on a houseboat in Deptford Creek, just off the River Thames, and trying to come to terms with her recent experiences. She has also abandoned her career as a detective to become a uniformed police officer again, hoping that her new position patrolling the river with the Marine Unit will be less stressful. While out swimming in the Thames early one morning (not something to be recommended!) she discovers a dead body floating in the river, wrapped in a white linen shroud. It seems that Lacey’s plans for a more peaceful life have been thwarted already…

I wish I could discuss the plot in more detail as it was fascinating, but if I say any more I’ll be giving too much away and spoiling the mystery for future readers. Instead I’ll mention the setting and the atmosphere, which were both as wonderful as I’ve come to expect from Sharon Bolton’s novels. The story is set almost entirely on the Thames and I loved the descriptions of the creeks and waterways, the derelict pumping station and the marina where Lacey’s boat is moored. I didn’t find this book quite as creepy as some of Bolton’s others, but there were a few scenes involving crabs that weren’t very pleasant!

If you’re new to this series you could start here if you wanted to (it’s a complete novel, with a beginning, middle and end), but my recommendation would be to begin with Now You See Me and read the series in order so that you can watch Lacey’s character develop book by book. She’s such a complex and secretive person that although you learn a little bit more about her in each novel you’re always left with the feeling that there’s still a lot more to learn. I particularly enjoy reading about her trips to Durham to visit the prisoner Toc, possibly the only person who really knows and understands Lacey and her troubled past.

Of course, Lacey is not the only interesting character in the series – another is Detective Inspector Dana Tulloch. I’ve never liked Dana much before and her treatment of Lacey in the previous book really annoyed me, but I found myself warming to her at last. In this book, she and her partner Helen make the decision to have a child and I’ll be interested to see how that storyline continues in the next book – assuming there is going to be a next book! I was disappointed, though, that Mark Joesbury doesn’t have a big role to play this time – although he does have a very good reason for his absence.

This is not my favourite book in the series – that would still be the third one, Like This, For Ever – but I did enjoy reading this dark and twisted tale.

I received a copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley for review.

The Convictions of John Delahunt by Andrew Hughes

March 24, 201410 Comments

Imagine you’re a poor student at Dublin’s Trinity College in the 1840s. You’re newly married and living with your wife in a squalid tenement, cut off from friends and family. The future looks bleak, so when the authorities at Dublin Castle suggest that you become an informer, it seems to be the perfect solution. You will be rewarded well for any information you can give them leading to a conviction…and if you could just manage to witness a few murders, your money troubles could be over!

This is the situation in which our narrator finds himself in this wonderfully moody and sinister historical crime novel, The Convictions of John Delahunt. As the novel opens, John is sitting in a prison cell awaiting his death. We’re not sure exactly what he has done, except that it appears to involve the murder of a child. As he begins to write his final testimony, we are taken back to the origins of John’s dangerous career as an informer and discover how and why this young student of natural philosophy has been sentenced to hang.

Andrew Hughes is also the author of a non-fiction book about the residents of Dublin’s Fitzwilliam Square, Lives Less Ordinary, and so he has been able to draw on his knowledge of the city’s history to make John Delahunt’s world feel authentic and real. Because of the circles in which Delahunt moves, the focus is on the darker side of society – workhouses, grave robbing, illegal abortions, rat-killing and laudanum addiction are all explored. Dublin’s streets and alleys, taverns and parks, courtrooms and drawing rooms are all vividly described and although the language the author uses is modern enough to be accessible and easy to read, it never feels out of place with the Victorian setting.

John Delahunt himself is an intriguing narrator, though not always entirely reliable. He is certainly not easy to like – one of his first actions in the book is to tell a lie to the police that leads to a friend being found guilty of a crime he didn’t commit – yet I could still feel for him when things didn’t go according to plan and when he saw his life beginning to disintegrate around him.

A large part of John’s story revolves around his relationship with his wife, Helen, who is another interesting character – although we never get to see things from her perspective as John is narrating in the first person. At first Helen seems to be on the same wavelength as her husband, attending a hanging with him and even helping him to compile a list of friends, family and neighbours to inform on. Later in the book she experiences a personal tragedy and after this she seems to undergo a change, though because we only see her through John’s eyes, her true thoughts and emotions are not very clear.

I loved this dark and atmospheric book and was completely gripped by John Delahunt’s fascinating story (based on true events, by the way). A word of advice to potential readers – don’t start reading it in your lunch break at work or in bed when you need to be up early the next day, as you may find that you really don’t want to put it down!

Thanks to the publisher for providing a review copy via NetGalley