View source for In Her Blood by Annie Hauxwell

{{infobox1
|title=In Her Blood
|author=Annie Hauxwell
|reviewer=Sue Magee
|genre=Crime
|summary=Set within the Financial Services Agency and with a great central character there's a lot more action than you might be expecting.
|rating=4
|buy=Yes
|borrow=Yes
|pages=272
|publisher=William Heinemann
|date=May 2012
|isbn=978-0434021802
|website=http://www.anniehauxwell.com/default.asp
|cover=0434021806
|aznuk=0434021806
|aznus=0434021806
}}

Catherine Berlin is known to everyone simply as 'Berlin'.  She's in her mid fifties, a civilian investigator with the Financial Services Agency - and she's been a heroin addict for more than twenty years.  It's largely controlled by her GP - one of the few understanding ones left - who prescribes pharmaceutical-grade heroin on her weekly visit to his surgery.  He's taught her to manage her addiction.  Then two problems come together.  On a pre-arranged meet with an informant who has information about a loan shark she finds the woman's body floating in Limehouse Basin - with the head nearly severed from the body.  And when she visits her GP's surgery she finds another body.  Then it's not just her job that's at risk.

I've a background in financial investigation and this book appealed to me immediately.  But don't be put off by the thought that it might be about some financial shenanigans carefully concealed with the Profit and Loss Accounts.  It's an action story of the type which has led Channel 4 and Cowboy Films to buy the rights to turn it into a TV series.  If finance doesn't speak to you, don't worry - you'll not feel the pain.  But you might be interested by the way that loan sharks operate and it's a very real problem in some areas.

I thought Berlin's heroin addiction might be another of the distinguishing features which every fictional investigator needs, but it is a very real part of the story.  It also raises the very pertinent question of whether the police really want the drug suppliers closed down.  That pushes the price up and the incidence of other serious crimes with it.  Annie Hauxwell has done her research and it's obvious that she understands the situation into which she's dropped her story.

The dialogue is a little stilted on occasions and the story is perhaps a little slow after the initial opening flurry of bodies, but it's more than compensated for by the complexity of the plot.  I had a much simpler solution in mind and I was genuinely taken by surprise by how it worked out.  There's a high body count and quite a bit of violence but it's never gratuitous.

It's the first in a series of novels featuring Berlin and I'll certainly be looking out for the next to see if Hauxwell can maintain this pace.  I'd like to thank the publishers for sending a copy to the Bookbag.

For another drug-taking detective we can recommend [[A Death in Valencia by Jason Webster]].  For more aboutcrime in London, you might like to try [[The Gilded Edge by Danny Miller]].  But if it's London you're interested in then have a look at our [[Top Ten Books About London]].

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