The Colours of Death by Patricia Marques (review)

The Colours of Death by Patricia Marques

Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton

Release Date: June 17 2021

Format: Hardcover

Price: £16.99

Reviewer: Carole Tyrell

Lisbon’s morning rush hour is at its peak when a man is violently murdered in front of a packed train of horrified commuters.  But no one saw the murderer, only their victim being thrown through a window before falling, bloodied and broken to the floor.

Inspector Isabel Reis of the Police Judiciary is called to the Gare de Orient to survey the scene after shocked and terrified commuters, and potential witnesses, have fled.  It’s already being seen as a possible Gifted Homicide and she can already see evidence of it.  Once again, the gifted in Portuguese society are being targeted as dangerous and murderous.

Isabel is also Gifted and is required to have it stated on her PJ ID badge.  They are regarded with suspicion, contempt and hatred. An abomination is one way in which they are described and from the age of 5, when her talent was first discovered, Isabel has known that they are reviled.  Gifted people are either telepaths or telekinetic and Isabel is one of the former.

She also has a new partner, Inspector Aleksandr Voronov, who gave evidence against his former Gifted partner.  This makes her uneasy with him.  All Gifted people in the PJ are required to have a Regular, or non-Gifted, partner.  This is an alternative Lisbon where the Gifted live uneasily with the Regulars.  They are seen as people who can invade your mind and your privacy without you knowing and a right-wing political party, the PNP, makes great play on this.  The Gifted community are the elephant in the room that no one wants to acknowledge.

The murder victim is identified as Gil dos Santos, the head of Portugal’s National Testing Institute, where all Gifted people are identified and classified.  It’s where Isabel went to be tested when her talent was first beginning to manifest itself.

As the investigation gets underway, they begin by speaking to his second in command at the HTI, Celia Armindas and go through his Cloud files. He was scheduled to visit a comatose hospital patient who was once a Gifted Guide but why?  Gil was also undertaking research on trial drugs for the Gifted and there is a suggestion that the Government were interested in weaponising the Gifted.

But Isabel’s finding it hard.  She’s been taking powerful pills to suppress her telepathic talent but lately they haven’t been working as well.  As a result, she increases her dosage to up to 4 a day which gives her constant headaches.  When another high-profile murder takes place by an invisible assailant, Isabel and Aleks are under pressure to find the murderer fast. Isabel begins to meet other Gifted people who are living under the wire and who become part of the investigation.  Do they know more than they are admitting?  It isn’t long before she realises that the murderer may be one of the most deadly and powerful Gifted people ever known and that they’ve turned their attention to her – will she be next?

This is a very confident, original debut novel and I really enjoyed reading it.  The author created a completely believable and disturbing alternative reality.  Isabel was a powerful character who lived with her special talent as best she could and was becoming uncomfortably aware that the pills were no longer keeping it under control.  In fact, she may be more Gifted than she can imagine.  The author described the plight of the Gifted people so well as they are controlled more and more.

I also felt that this was a bold novel with its combination of genres and demonstrates how the crime and thriller genre can encompass many strands and ideas.  The Colours of Death was fast paced and had a very serpentine plot but it never lost sight of the person at its heart, Isabel, and her conflicted self.

The descriptions of Lisbon made me feel that I was actually walking its streets with Isabel and Aleks in the winter city as they search for a murderer.

This is one of the best debut novels that I’ve read this year and Patricia Marques is a writer to watch.   I’m already looking forward to reading more about Inspector Isabel Reis.

The Rising Tide by Sam Lloyd (review)

The Rising Tide by Sam Lloyd

Publisher: ‎ Bantam Press

Release date‏: ‎ 8 July 2021

Price: £12.99

Format: Hardcover ‏[also available as eBook and Audiobook}

Reviewed by Adam Colclough

Lucy has, outwardly at least a perfect life with a husband, two children and a thriving arts business in a picturesque village on the Devon coast. Scratch the surface and there are problems, but these are as nothing compared to the troubles that are, literally, about to knock on her door.

 

In the space of a few hours the family yacht is found adrift and abandoned, her husband and children have disappeared, and an epic storm is disrupting attempts to find them. The world Lucy thought she had created for her family suddenly looks terrifyingly fragile.

 

Lloyd’s second novel, looks like a strong candidate to be one of the thrillers of the year. He shows a master’s touch for using the dramatic landscape of the Devonshire coastline to ramp up the tension and mirror the turmoil experienced by his characters. Unsurprisingly given the setting, one county along from her stamping ground, the ghost of Daphne Du Maurier hovers over the book making approving and even slightly jealous noises.

 

Lloyd has written a narrative that is often painfully dark and that refuses to shy away from the cruelty of which humans are capable, leavening the lump of this with an awareness of how tragedy can bring out resilience in those experiencing it. This is shown by a cast of characters who are defined by their flaws as well as the exceptional situation they find themselves in.

 

This is a darkly atmospheric and sometimes deeply unsettling thriller from a writer with a powerful gift for keeping his audience permanently on edge.

 

 

One Half Truth by Eva Dolan (review)

ONE HALF TRUTH By Eva Dolan

Publisher:  Raven Books

Format: Hardback [also available as eBook and Audiobook]

Price:  £14.99

Release Date:  13 May 2021

Reviewer:  Sara Townsend

When detectives DI Dushan Zigic and DS Mel Ferreira are called to the report of a late-night shooting, they expect it to be drugs or gang related. They don’t expect to find a young student journalist murdered on his way home, for no apparent reason.

The case becomes more complex when it is discovered that those responsible for the death of Jordan Radley also broke into his house to take his laptop and notes of his latest case, which had to do with the closure of an engineering firm four years earlier, and the devastating impact it had on the community. A sad story, but surely not one worth murdering for. Zigic and Ferreira dig a bit deeper and begin to believe that Jordan was investigating something else, a bigger story that had the potential for a more explosive impact, but all evidence of what he was working on has vanished.

This the sixth book in the series featuring DI Zigic and DS Ferreira. There’s not much of an insight into these two main characters, and I imagine those who have followed the series from the beginning, and know the characters well, will get more out of the story. The writing is tight and flows into a satisfactory conclusion, although there are no real twists or explosive plot revelations. However, fans of police procedurals, even those who are not familiar with the earlier books in the series, will still enjoy this well-written and engaging novel.

 

 

Total Blackout by Alex Shaw - Reviewed by Andy Hill

 

HarperCollins, pbk £8.99. Released Nov 26, 2020

Jack Tate is having a well-earned break in Maine, after a recent mission. The former SAS trooper is now a member of E Squadron, an ‘off the books’ military cadre, employed by MI6 for undercover operations where the Government needs support a regime but doesn’t want visibility.

His sojourn in America’s most north-easterly state is rudely interrupted by the detonation of an EMP (Electro-Magnetic Pulse) device over Washington D.C. With the devastation of the U.S. power grid and anything with a computer chip in it looting and violence in the streets erupts across the country.

In the ensuing chaos, the entities behind the EMP start a systematic campaign to assassinate or kidnap important targets. Is this another country bringing down the U.S.A?

With the conventional military impotent, it falls to Jack to improvise and overcome.

Alex Shaw takes the reader on a breakneck ride that just doesn’t let up for a moment. There’s certainly enough ‘tech’ and weapons for Clancy and McNab fans, but, Jack is by no means just a chisel-jawed, one-dimensional hero. The author gives him a backstory, feelings and a raison d’etre, which added to this readers enjoyment.

Add in a Washington D.C. cop on a mission; a ‘back from the dead’ villain; Jack’s foster parent’s son; EMP-shielded cars; helicopters; private jets and action that never lets up for a moment and you have a white-knuckle ride opener for a new series from Alex Shaw.

Thoroughly recommended.

February Reviews

Listing of reviews on the website in February

Leigh Russell	Journey to Death	22 February, 2016
Rob McCarthy	The Hollow Men	22 February, 2016
Jorn Lier Horst	Ordeal	18 February, 2016
Christine Matthews	Beating the Bushes	18 February, 2016
Joe R. Lansdale	Honky Tonk Samurai	16 February, 2016
Jonathan Freedland	The Third Woman	16 February, 2016
Graham Masterton	Buried	07 February, 2016
Valero Varesi	A Woman Much Missed	05 February, 2016
Stefan Ahnhem	Victim Without A Face	05 February, 2016
David Thorne	Promises of Blood	03 February, 2016
Anna Smith	Rough Cut	01 February, 2016
Samuel Bjørk	I’m Travelling Alone	01 February, 2016

HOW TO WRITE A BOOK REVIEW?

I thought you’d find this amusing. An article by Mike Kington on How to Write a Book Review.
Hello, there.
Today I am going to tell you how to write a book review.
I am constantly surprised by the number of people I meet who have never written a book review, or, if they have, did not realise they were doing it at the time.
It is different with novels.
All of you, of course, will have written a novel by now.
Some of you may even have had it published and remaindered.
So you will know all about the art of fiction, which consists in telling the reader about your characters.
But what is book reviewing about?
Book review writing is very much the same, except that instead of telling people about characters, the idea is to tell the reader all about YOU.
But surely, I hear you protest, the idea of writing a book review is to tell the reader all about the book under review, and the writer.
Oh, please. This is no time for naivete.
When you sit down to write a book review, you have five vital things to communicate.
a) How it represents a falling off from the author's previous book or books. (eg. "For reasons best known to herself, she has abandoned her hitherto successful family studies...")
b) How it reminds you of other writers, usually better. (eg. "We are in Zadie Smith country here, with a dash of Martin Amis...")
c) How you would have written the book differently if it had been up to you. ("There must have been times when she had severe doubts about having three separate narrators...")
d) What is wrong with the cover. ("The jacket design would look good on a history of Venice. This book, however, is meant to be a study of the psychology of art theft...")
e) How, despite everything, the book is well worth reading. ("But despite everything, I think the book is worth reading...")
That sounds as if you are writing about the book.
You are not.
You are writing about yourself.
What you are saying is:-
a) YOU have dutifully read other stuff by the same author.
b)You have read stuff by other authors.
c) You are a better author than this author.
d) And a better artist.
e) But you are filled with good-hearted generosity.
Evelyn Waugh once said that the golden rule of book reviewing is that you should never give a bad review to a book you have not read. This is now seen as rather old-fashioned and romantic. No book reviewer ever has time to read the whole book, not for the money they are paying you. The vital thing is to give the impression that you HAVE read the whole book.
This can easily be done by only quoting from near the end of the book.
And by pointing out an error.
Like this:
"Proof reading is not what it used to be, and too many basic errors have crept in. The Battle of Lepanto was, of course, in 1571, not 1471, as the author would have us believe."
You have to find an error first, of course. If you can't, don't worry; make one up. I knew a reviewer who wrote "Jerome K Jerome's middle name was, of course, Klapka, not Kafka" in at least twenty different reviews of books which had never once mentioned Jerome K Jerome, till he was finally rumbled.