2 BY JEFF JOHNSON

A couple from US author Jeff Johnson, someone who I have actually read something by previously.

Funny, noir, tattoos, crime, the FBI, punk rock, love and criminality - what's not to like?
Plus John Irving - A Prayer For Owen Meany author - one of my all time favourite ever books likes him.

The Animals After Midnight was read back in January this year. It's the third in Johnson's Darby Holland series and was enjoyed despite not having read either of the earlier ones.

A Long Crazy Burn is the second in his series, following on from Lucky Supreme. Knottspeed is a standalone novel.

From his website here......

JEFF JOHNSON IS AN AMERICAN NOVELIST, SCREENWRITER, INDEPENDENT DIRECTOR AND HARD WORKING ARTIST GENERALLY BLAMED FOR THE CRITICALLY ACCLAIMED TATTOO MACHINE, EVERYTHING UNDER THE MOON, KNOTTSPEED A LOVE STORY, THE DARBY HOLLAND CRIME TRILOGY LUCKY SUPREME, A LONG CRAZY BURN, AND THE ANIMALS AFTER MIDNIGHT AND THE PHILADELPHIA NOIR NOVEL DEADBOMB BINGO RAY. THE LUCKY SUPREME TRILOGY WAS ACQUIRED BY ITALIAN PUBLISHER FANUCCI AND OPTIONED FOR TELEVISION BY THE OSCAR WINNING MARK HARRIS OF THE HARRIS COMPANY. THE KINJIKU IS JOHNSON’S DIRECTORAL DEBUT. REPRESENTATION BY STUART MILLER.



A Long Crazy Burn (2017)


The second in the series of funny noir crime novels set in Portland, Oregon's seedy side, featuring Darby Holland, owner of The Lucky Supreme tattoo parlor, and his slightly mad side kick - the twiggy, vinyl clad tattoo artist, Delia

Time is up in Old Town. As the pace of gentrification reaches frenzy in Portland, Oregon, Darby Holland's beloved tattoo parlor, Lucky Supreme, is destroyed by a bomb that ripped through an entire city block. Only a warning call from his favorite prostitute saved his life. Developers have been like wolves at the door of Dmitri (the drunken landlord) for the past few years, but this is different.

With nothing to lose, Darby goes on a rampage to discover first the bomber then the developer who set everything in motion, and along the way falls under FBI suspicion, messes with dangerous pimps and drug lords, gets his face permanently rearranged, and, then, at the lowest point in his adult life, Darby Holland meets the woman of his dreams. Long, lanky, smart, and a foot taller than Darby, Suzanne is a woman of enormous appetite. Darby has finally met his match in bed and at the dinner table. But Suzanne, for all her strength and wisdom, can't save Darby from his enemies.

Fortunately, Delia (Darby's tiny vinyl clad side-kick) and her punk-rock boyfriend's band can, and in one of the most outrageous capers in crime fiction, Darby, Big Mike, Nigel, and Flaco (Lucky Supreme faithfuls) impersonate restaurant staff to brilliantly orchestrate a kidnapping of a Russian crime boss, making full use of an Armenian smuggling operation to pave the way for justice and the resurrection of the Lucky Supreme.

Knottspeed (2017)

Enigmatic, charming, and brutally resourceful, Knottspeed is a man on a mission. He also happens to be dead, but the rumors of his demise have been slightly exaggerated - by the man himself as the key to his plan.

A problem-solver, a finder of lost people and rare things, and an accomplished criminal, Knottspeed is experiencing Big Love for the first time in his life, and his elaborately orchestrated plot to reunite with his beloved will profoundly affect everyone he meets, including a rudderless, alcoholic piano player; a wealthy, dispassionate doctor; and an amiable-but-desperate cab driver. From the bars and graveyards of Portland, Oregon to the taco stands and charity hospitals of East Los Angeles, Knottspeed is the uncompromisingly offbeat story about the momentum of love.

"As hip and cool as the neon rain-slicked streets of Portland. Darby Holland is a modern hero in the mold of Sam Spade and Marlowe only with more tattoos and in steel-toed boots. A funny and very gritty book with cool folks, cool music, and wonderful sense of place." - Ace Atkins

"Jeff Johnson is a gifted and natural born storyteller." - John Irving

MICK HERRON - THE CATCH (2020)

Synopsis/blurb....

If life in the Intelligence Service has taught John Bachelor anything, it's to keep his head down. Especially now, when he's living rent-free in a dead spook's flat.

So he's not delighted to be woken at dawn by a pair of Regent's Park's heavies, looking for a client he's not seen in years. John doesn't know what secrets Benny Manors has stolen, but they're attracting the wrong attention. And if he's to save his own skin, not to mention safeguard his living arrangements, John has to find Benny before those secrets see the light.

Benny could be anywhere, provided it serves alcohol. So John sets out on a reluctant trawl through the bars of the capital, all the while plagued by the age-old questions: Will he end up sleeping in his car? How many bottles of gin can he afford at London prices?

And just how far will Regent's Park go to prevent anyone rocking the Establishment's boat?

A rather topical offering from Mick Herron with an 80-odd page novella, involving the hapless "milkman," John Bachelor in an operation reaching to the top of the service and Lady Di - Diana Taverner.

No plot spoilers here, so I'll not really mention it, suffice to say I really liked it. A spy op in the capital, a missing thief, some carelessness from Bachelor, a threat to livelihood, an ultimatum, a desperate search, a plea for help, some credibility lent, a journo, a shit storm, and a sting in the tale.The whys and the wherefores and the detail you can discover if you read it yourself.

On point throughout, a blend of one-liners, wit and shenanigans and double dealing. Jackson Lamb gets a name check but no more. I really feel for Bachelor. He's the lowest rung on the intelligence service ladder. He's been part-timed and is living in a dead man's flat, flying under the radar, or at least he thought he was. I'm hoping he continues, not necessarily to profit, as I don't think his star is ever going to ascend but to survive. Sad, desperate and down-trodden, dogged by ill-luck, supplemented by poor choices and rather too fond of imbibing, he's never dull.

Once this one ends, there's a thirty-forty page intro to Herron's This is What Happened. I have a copy somewhere and after reading the opener I ought to get to it.

5 from 5

Mick Herron has been enjoyed before, but only a couple of his Slough House offerings and some connected novellas. I really should get some more under my belt in 2020.
Slow Horses (2010), Dead Lions (2013), The List (2015), The Marylebone Drop (2018) have all been enjoyed.

Read - November, 2019
Published - 2020
Page count - 128
Source - Edelweiss - Above the Treeline early reviewer site, thanks to Soho Press
Format - ePub read on laptop

LAWRENCE BLOCK - THE ADULTERERS (1960)

Synopsis/blurb.....

Ah, yes. THE ADULTERATORS, the thrilling account of a couple of desperadoes whose violation of the Pure Food and Drug Act brought a nauseated nation to its knees, and— Oh, it’s THE ADULTERERS? Oh. Well, never mind. THE ADULTERERS was my second effort for Bill Hamling’s Nightstand Books. Like its predecessor, CAMPUS TRAMP, its cover was the work of Harold W. McCauley. I wrote the book in the fall of 1959, and it’s not hard to find its beginning in my own life a little over a year earlier. In May of 1958 I left the employ of Scott Meredith and went home to Buffalo, where I wrote my first novel, STRANGE ARE THE WAYS OF LOVE. Then, with my friend and Antioch roommate Steve Schwerner, I headed to Mexico to devote two months to rest and recreation before returning for another year at the college. We flew to Houston, hitchhiked to Laredo—and that last empty stretch of road from Freer to Laredo, where the book begins, has not faded from memory. We were a long time waiting for a ride, and learned later it was because nobody wanted to pick up a hitchhiker on that stretch of highway; if you did and he put you out of the car, you’d die out there. Well, the guys who picked us up weren’t worried. They were Tex-Mex gangsters in a block-long Caddy, and the car’s welcome A/C was cool, but they were way cooler. 

THE ADULTERERS features George and Mona Sutton, a sexually incompatible couple on their way to a Mexican divorce. But they meet a helpful guide named Ernesto, and that changes everything. Now Steve and I had met an Ernesto of our own, and he was helpful enough to steer us to some pot, but this Ernesto took George to a live sex show, and it made an impression on the fellow. And, not too long afterward, Mona drank enough rum and Coca-Cola to float a light cruiser, and wound up as the sex slave of El Tigre, who might have been a narco-trafficker if the career category had existed back then. So it’s a story of evolving depravity. And it’s dedicated, you’ll note, to Steve and Letitia. You already know who Steve is. Letitia was a young woman at work in one of the establishments we visited, and he became quite fond of her. But, you know, those summer romances never work out…

Another accompaniment to the week's commuting and another early Lawrence Block book, with a smidge of criminal content and a whole lot more about sex, though because of the era it was written and published nothing very explicit.

George and Mona are married and not especially happy. They love each other, but don't get along in the sack. George strays on occasions for relief and satisfaction. Mona has sampled other men, but with the same dissatisfied result. A trip to Mexico - kill or cure. Either a spark will ignite the flames of passion in them both and they have a happy ever after or they seek a divorce and go their separate ways.

The vacation needless to say does not go as planned....... visas, border crossings, hotel rooms, bars, a tour guide, a sex show, a separation, Mona to a bar and drunkenness that leads to a pick-up and a somewhat life changing encounter. George to the show and some agreeable companionship.

Without spoiling things there's a parting of the ways. Mona's encounter with the cruel El Tigre, an insatiable abuser and sadist, as well as criminal king-pin unlocks her libido and provides her with what she has been missing. George descends into the bottle and ends up in a flea-pit room, scrounging nickels from tourists for rocket-fuel wine, day after day after day. An encounter with a couple of Princetown men sees George reacquainted with Mona, herself the star of the kind of show you might not want to take your mother to. George finds some short-lived rage and purpose to his life.

Best book ever, nope, far from it, but it kept me entertained and amused for a few hours. I was curious to see how it all turned out and while the story and the eventual denouement was slightly implausible who cares. It did what it needed to do.

3 from 5

Read - (listened to) November, 2019
Published - 1960
Page count - 182 pages (4 hrs 20 mins)
Source - Audible download code received from author's assistant
Format - Audible

CANDICE FOX - CRIMSON LAKE (2017)

Synopsis/blurb...

How do you move on when the world won't let you?

12:46: Claire Bingley stands alone at a bus stop
12:47: Ted Conkaffey parks his car beside her
12:52: The girl is missing . . .

Six minutes in the wrong place at the wrong time - that's all it took to ruin Sydney detective Ted Conkaffey's life. Accused but not convicted of a brutal abduction, Ted is now a free man - and public enemy number one. Maintaining his innocence, he flees north to keep a low profile amidst the steamy, croc-infested wetlands of Crimson Lake.

There, Ted's lawyer introduces him to eccentric private investigator Amanda Pharrell, herself a convicted murderer. Not entirely convinced Amanda is a cold-blooded killer, Ted agrees to help with her investigation, a case full of deception and obsession, while secretly digging into her troubled past. The residents of Crimson Lake are watching the pair's every move . . . and the town offers no place to hide.

"Complex, human characters, and a dark, meaty story, and fine writing, and a great sense of place - this is one of the best crime thrillers of the year. Sign me up as a big-time Fox fan!" - #1 New York Times bestselling author Lee Child

A bit of Australian crime with Crimson Lake from Candice Fox.

Three mysteries at the heart of this book.....

Our main man Ted Conkaffey suffering the fall-out from his proximity to the abduction and rape of a young girl. Arrested, released without charge, loss of career, family, friends, a free man in name only, convicted in the court of public opinion.... who was responsible?

Ted, pitched up in the ass-end of nowhere - Crimson Lake, teamed up with a strange PI, herself convicted of a murder years ago. Amanda served the time, but did she do the crime? Ted has a sniff around.

Lastly, our intrepid PIs, are engaged to look into the disappearance of a successful author. His wife frustrated by the lack of progress the police have made. 

Busy with lots going on, I really liked this one......a normal life lost, an angry public, threats, media intrusion, an investigative journalist, small town gossip, a missing author, a strange family, some dodgy cops, weird fans, some much needed support, anger, intimidation, vigilante action, investigations and some
answers.

Despite it's length of over 400 pages it's a quick read and it was one I find myself not really wanting to put down. I liked how the author knitted the different cases together into the narrative. I liked the main character though I preferred Ted to the troubled and unpredictable Amanda. I liked how the author stops short of giving us answers to all the outstanding questions without making it feel like a cliffhanger or a compelling invitation to read the next book (though I probably will).

I shared Ted's sense of desperation, his loss and confusion, his displacement, his loneliness and grief but also admired his drawing back from the precipice, his re-found sense of purpose and motivation, the resolve to keep going in the face of overwhelming disdain and scorn from the wider world. It's quite topical how the media can incite the public to pre-judge people confusing innuendo and speculation with facts.

This was my first time reading Candice Fox, but not my last.

4.5 from 5

Read - November, 2019
Published - 2017
Page count - 416
Source - owned copy
Format - paperback

JOHN DUNNING - BOOKED TO DIE (1992)

Synopsis/blurb.....

Denver homicide detective Cliff Janeway may not always play by the book, but he is an avid collector of rare and first editions. After a local bookscout is killed on his turf, Janeway would like nothing better than to rearrange the suspect's spine. But the suspect, local lowlife Jackie Newton, is a master at eluding the law, and Janeway's wrathful brand of off-duty justice costs him his badge.

Turning to his lifelong passion, Janeway opens a small bookshop - all the while searching for evidence to put Newton away. But when prized volumes in a highly sought-after collection begin to appear so do dead bodies. Now Janeway's life is about to start a precarious new chapter as he attempts to find out who's dealing death along with vintage Chandlers and Twains.

"A knockout... One of the most enjoyable books I've read in a long time." - The Denver Post

"A standout piece of crime fiction.... Compelling page-turning stuff." - The Philadelphia Inquirer

"Irresistible... An outstanding novel." - The Plain Dealer (Cleveland)

Booked to Die is the first in John Dunning's series featuring Cliff Janeway. Janeway is a cop, then an ex-cop turned bookshop owner. This one's a fantastic read with lots going on..... a feud between a cop and a psychopath responsible for the deaths of some itinerants, but still a free man - Janeway frustrated by a combination of lack of evidence and some smart lawyers; our cop with a knowledge and a keen interest in books (a subject close to my own heart); a murder in the book world and a further coming together of our two combatants Cliff Janeway and head-case Jackie Newton; resulting in a career change, some new friends, some off the records investigating and an escalation in Janeway and Newton's ongoing private battle.

When a book is so enjoyable it's sometimes hard to articulate just exactly what it is that makes it just so memorable.

Without being able to do this one justice, we have.... character, pace, story, setting - time frame of 1986 and the locale - Denver and books, bookshops, bookscouts, book dealers, and collectors; a pair of combatants locked in a private battle, each unwilling to yield to the other, one a good guy, one the personification of evil; murder, rape, intimidation, an obsession, a career burned, a field day for the press, a dream turned reality, the book business - the highs and lows, the pitfalls and windfalls, the hunt, the chase, the connections, the rivalries, the friendships, the favours, the optimism......... not forgetting - a murder to solve and some unfinished business with a bit of romance chucked in along the way.

One of the front cover blurbs states its a "whodunit in the classic mode." I haven't read enough of these types of books to confirm whether the comparison is apt. I do know that I loved every page of this one. There's fisticuffs, violence and brutality present which may be at odds to the classic whodunit, which suggest a more genteel way of doing things, but they suit the book perfectly and are sporadic occurrences to suit the story, as opposed to a vehicle constantly propelling the tale forward. There are lulls in the action, but the book maintains its drive and momentum. Action blended with thought.

Ticks in every box. I'm off to track down the second in this five book series featuring Cliff Janeway.

*As an added source of pleasure, my 2001 edition published by Pocket Star Books has an entertaining introduction by the author chatting about his novel and it's early collectability as well as other bits and pieces about books, scarcity and his experience in the field of dealing and collecting.
Booked to Die won the Nero Award and was nominated for the 1993 Anthony Award in the "Best Novel" category

5 from 5

Read - November, 2019
Published - 1992
Page count - 432
Source - purchased copy
Format - paperback

2 BY IAN RANKIN

A couple from Scottish author and crime fiction heavyweight Ian Rankin.

I've been reading in the genre 30 years give or take with most of the first 15-20 mainly concentrated on American crime fiction, but since gravitating to crime on my home shores I've never really got stuck into Rankin and Rebus. I'm pretty sure I read one of them way back before record keeping began, so it probably doesn't count.


Since 2010 I've read him twice and one of those was a Quick Read - A Cool Head (2009), the other - The Complaints (2009)

Maybe 2020 I'll repent and mend my ways. It's not like he hasn't written a few!


Tooth and Nail (1992)

They call him the Wolfman - because he takes a nip out of his victims and because they found the first victim in the East End's lonely Wolf Street. But there's no urban predator that Rebus fears. When Scotland Yard are anxious to find the last serial killer on their patch they look north and soon Rebus is on his way south from the chill of Edinburgh to the rain of London. A serial killerfrom Dr Liza Frazer is attractive in more ways than one and Rebus is happy to take her up on her offer of help. But in taking on one ally who doesn't think that everyone achilles heel in the fight against the Wolfman.







Exit Music (2007)

It's late autumn in Edinburgh and late autumn in the career of Detective Inspector John Rebus. As he tries to tie up some loose ends before retirement, a murder case intrudes. A dissident Russian poet has been found dead in what looks like a mugging gone wrong. By apparent coincidence a high-level delegation of Russian businessmen is in town, keen to bring business to Scotland. The politicians and bankers who run Edinburgh are determined that the case should be closed quickly and clinically. But the further they dig, the more Rebus and his colleague DS Siobhan Clarke become convinced that they are dealing with something more than a random attack - especially after a particularly nasty second killing. Meantime, a brutal and premeditated assault on local gangster 'Big Ger' Cafferty sees Rebus in the frame. Has the Inspector taken a step too far in tying up those loose ends? Only a few days shy of the end to his long, inglorious career, will Rebus even make it that far?

RUSSELL ROWLAND - COLD COUNTRY (2019)

Synopsis/blurb....

Montana, 1968: The small town of Paradise Valley is ripped open when popular rancher and notorious bachelor Tom Butcher is found murdered one morning, beaten to death by a baseball bat. Suspicion among the tight-knit community immediately falls on the outsider, Carl Logan, who recently moved in with his family and his troubled son Roger. What Carl doesn't realize is that there are plenty of people in Paradise Valley who have reason to kill Tom Butcher.

Complications arise when the investigating officers discover that Tom Butcher had a secret--a secret he kept even from Junior Kirby, a lifelong rancher and Butcher's best friend. As accusations fly and secrets are revealed one after another, the people of Paradise Valley learn how deeply Tom Butcher was embedded in their lives, and that they may not have known him at all.

With familiar mastery, Russell Rowland, the author of In Open Spaces and Fifty-Six Counties, returns to rural Montana to explore a small town torn apart by secrets and suspicions, and how the tenuous bonds of friendship struggle to hold against the differences that would sever us.

An enjoyable book which I fairly raced through and completed in just over a day. I do like small town mysteries, where the introduction of an outsider, or in this case the Logan family upsets the balance and harmony in the community.

Carl Logan is appointed as ranch manager by Peter Kenwood, an act which causes friction and resentment among Kenwood's other workers. Kenwood himself isn't fully accepted by the community in Paradise Valley. Rich and with a sense of entitlement and family connections, he's tolerated. He's also in competition with brash, arrogant and self confident rancher Tom Boucher. Boucher is the louder than loud dynamic personality, the one that fills a room all by himself. He's not universally popular, having upset more than one resident of the town in the past.

Logan is also trying to get his wife on board regarding the recent sea change. She's none too happy about the family upheaval and the new job, location and lifestyle having grownup on a ranch herself. Having successfully escaped it once, she isn't best pleased to be back where she began. To say there's some unresolved tensions in the family, might be an understatement.

Their son Roger also has trouble fitting in. A playground spat with another boy has the potential to leave him and his sister Julie, permanent outsiders among the younger members of the town. The knock on effect also resonates with some added friction for his father.

Boucher gets murdered and fingers are pointed.

Small town drama, murder, late 60s setting, Kennedy and Vietnam in the back drop, community friction, resentment, spite, greed, conflict over land, ambition, secrets, a possible affair, small town gossip, marital tensions, mistreatment of a child, a reliance on alcohol and other meds, a party or two, a reluctant workforce, a hard to please boss, friendship, support, abandonment and after a fairly frenetic 250-odd pages some answers.

I really liked the characters here, the friction, the tensions, the rivalries, I never quite knew which what the next little drama was going to be and in which direction the author was going to take the plot and how it would impact on the Logans - both adults and children. I was firmly rooting for the family throughout.

There's also another couple that feature strongly in the book, Junior Kirby and his wife. Both are wise, likeable, supportive and understanding and the glue on which small communities thrive. I think they were my favourite characters overall. They are the heartbeat of the town, almost universally trusted and respected and their interactions with most of the other townsfolk provides a window to getting to know some of the others, including the murder victim and his possible killer better. 

Great sense of place, interesting plot, one of the secrets which one of the residents harboured, I kind of found a bit of a stretch, credibility wise, but as they say it takes all sorts. Definitely not enough to bump me out of the book. I was satisfied with the outcome. Overall a very good book.

4.5 from 5

Russell Rowland has written a four other novels. This was my first time with his writing.

Read - November, 2019
Published - 2019
Page count - 248
Source - Edelweiss - Above the Treeline review site, courtesy of Dzanc Books
Format - ePub read on laptop