Some events cause ripples. Other events shape lives. When Samuel Darte’s mother disappears one morning, his life doesn’t alter course slightly, it derails and becomes stuck. Stunned by the suddenness of it all, Samuel is disbelieving, determined to uncover the truth at the cost of his own life, which remains immured in a past he […]
People’s Police murder squad leader Karin Muller has been through a lot. When I read Young’s stunning debut novel, ‘Stasi Child’, I delighted in the clever and absorbing story, but wondered what else Young could throw at his rather naïve, highly principled and dedicated detective. The answer has turned out to be, a heck of […]
If the cold doesn’t kill you, the truth will. As ever, the latest story in David Young’s Stasi series demands your attention with a chilling strapline, an intriguing cover and a tale of an impossible task. Karin Muller wants to know the truth about the murders she investigates, but in 1970s East Germany, the truth […]
This is story that deserves to be told. Although Young’s characters are fictional, the events depicted in 1945 during the death throes of Nazi Germany, are horrific facts. Though this is a primarily a detective story, it’s clear that ‘Stasi 77’ also functions as a disturbing reminder, not just of certain historical events, but of […]
‘It was almost like she seriously didn’t care about the exhaust system.’ This is why I enjoy Lianne Moriarty’s books. The third person narration offers a frequently amusing and consistently insightful look into people’s inner thoughts and closest relationships, usually supported by a gradually tightening suspense story. Having previously read and enjoyed several of Moriarty’s […]
We’re all familiar with the notion of a placebo. We all know how powerful placebos can be, but it’s perhaps rarer to recognise the power of noceboes. In ‘Humankind’, Rutger Bregman is determined to disabuse us of one particularly devastating nocebo, ‘veneer theory’. This is the widely accepted idea that our civil natures are only […]
Had enough of the dreaded virus dominating the news? How better to escape the anxieties induced by living in semi-lockdown, caused by a troublesome new virus, than to read a crime thriller exploring a world in which, erm, a troublesome new virus is wreaking havoc in London? Louise Welsh’s superbly atmospheric novel makes it clear […]
No, I haven’t branched out into reviewing erotica. The title of Tsutsui’s collection is apt, however, as it features stories which are always bizarre and frequently feature sexual deviance. Of course, normality and sexual propriety are cultural constructs, and Tsutsui delights in tearing these apart to examine them. Amongst this apparently wanton destruction, the reader […]
‘Dark, disturbing and authentic.’ This was the CWA judging panel’s judgement and I completely agree with this description (whilst noting that I don’t know enough about prisons to comment accurately on the third, but the officers’ attitudes feel plausible). So why did ‘The Woman Before Me’ win the CWA’s debut dagger? What’s it about? Rose […]
Imagine a world where ‘sharing’ is valued above all and privacy is considered a dangerous perversion. Such is the world Elton evokes in his 2007 tale of a world that’s exiled experts and lives in a state of ‘Blind Faith’, a world in which ignorance is feted as wisdom and everyone knows everything about everybody. […]