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The Night Stalker by Clare Donoghue (view source)
Revision as of 16:07, 20 August 2020
, 16:07, 20 August 2020no edit summary
And it turns out a lot more horrible stuff has been happening in these parts very recently while an apparently incompetent copper hasn't bothered to make the connections.
For those following the series, both Lockyer and Bennett are now back on full form. Of course , their lives remain complicated – that's now "a given" for British police fiction – but the impact of annoying ex-spouses, over-protective parents / daughters and autistic brothers / sons is are kept well in the background here.
I've been a fan of Donoghue's duo from the beginning, and where I've previously managed to dock a star for minor quibbles, I can't do that this time. They are playing it by the book – and so is everyone else. The motivations of the bad guys work, the stresses and strains of those caught on the edges are rational and reasonable – the whole thing just simply works. Mainly, though I'm just happy to see two experienced coppers behaving like experienced coppers and not refugees from a soap opera. It might have taken three novels to get here, but this could now settle into a longish series, without stretching the bounds of credibility more than is required for the genre.
In a way , this is a 'country house mystery' updated for the 21st century. It's not quite 'closed room' but it does have the claustrophobic feel of the limited number of possible perpetrators, and its it's tightly plotted enough for you to find motives enough for each of them. At the 'crime' rather than the 'thriller' end of the spectrum it still manages to throw in a few fairly tense scenes with uncertain outcomes to keep you turning the pages.
Well-crafted, well-charactered, self-contained suspense, with a satisfying conclusion. More , please!
If this sounds like your sort of thing, do check out the previous instalments including [[No Place to Die by Clare Donoghue|No Place to Die]] or the [[Dead Scared by S J Bolton|Lacey Flint novels from Sharon Bolton]] for another touch of gutsy crime-fighting females. We also enjoyed [[rust No One by Clare Donoghue]].
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