Book Reviews

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Anthology #60

The Last Word, by Elly Griffiths

I was beginning to worry that this latest outing for DI Harbinder Kaur, now with the Met police in London, was somewhat pedestrian, given that her involvement is minimal, but the other protagonists, Ukrainian Natalka, and her Sussex detective agency partner, octogenarian Edwin, work well enough together to keep the narrative moving along. Natalka’s live-in boyfriend, the ex-monk Benedict, runs a coffee shack on the seafront, but he also helps out with the cases, where necessary. The latter have been pretty humdrum, until the partners are alerted to the possibility of the murder of a late middle-aged author, because of the suspicions of the woman’s daughters. She had married a much younger man, after the death of the daughters’ father, a few years ago, and had left everything in her will to her new spouse, especially a large house, which greatly displeased the rejected legatees, hence the suspicion of murder, despite the cause of death being registered as natural. The enquiries in this case suggest that a writers’ retreat might provide a connection, and from this, other questionable deaths also come to the investigators’ attention. The possible motives are hard to discern, and the evidence is circumstantial, at best, but one officer in the local CID is prepared to give credibility to the sleuths’ theories, especially when she is made aware that their work in previous cases was helpful to Harbinder, when she worked locally, and for whom the local officer has great respect. There are a couple of close shaves for the protagonists, but they manage to solve the case, albeit not before more deaths occur. Not quite Cosy Crime perhaps, but it is a plausible plot and a decent read. The hardback I read was published in 2024 by Quercus Editions, London, an [sic] Hachette UK company, ISBN 978-1-5294-3343-2.

Bad Boy, by Peter Robinson

This author’s DCI Banks novels are always a good read [and have transferred well to television], so I was pleased to find this one, which is possibly not one of the latest in the series, but still relatively recent. Banks is taking compassionate leave, following an earlier case which had a traumatic outcome; he is enjoying the attractions of California, USA. Unfortunately, this absence has negative repercussions for two families in his home area of Yorkshire. A young woman who is sharing a house with Banks’s daughter Tracy [who has taking to calling herself Francesca, to mask her perceived working class background] has taken a handgun from her boyfriend’s flat after a row, and secreted it in the bedroom of her family home, where she is currently ensconced. The row was caused by an impulsive drunken dancefloor kiss between Tracy and the woman’s boyfriend Jaffar [aka Jaff], who is notoriously promiscuous, but was seen by the woman, Erin Doyle. The gun is found by Erin’s mother, who takes it to the police station, hoping that Alan Banks, an old family friend, would be able to resolve the matter with a minimum of fuss; and, crucially, official involvement and/or legal implications. Alan’s absence and the alternative name means that the connection with his daughter goes unnoticed, his regular subordinate [and erstwhile romantic partner] Annie Cabbot not being told of Tracy’s connection. Because Tracy’s relationship with her father has not been great of late, she has no qualms in informing Jaff of developments, finding his Bad Boy reputation exciting, but very soon, events spiral out of control, and Tracy becomes a powerless, and threatened, passenger in a dangerous sequence. The tension is nicely developed, and another police officer who is attracted to Annie plays a decisive part in the dénouement. The paperback I read was published in 2014 [2010] by Hodder & Stoughton, an [sic] Hachette UK company, ISBN 978-1-4447-5405-6.

The Echoes, by Evie Wyld

I was hoping that this relatively short book was going to give me some enlightenment about the existence of a person’s spirit as a ghost after death; it would be fictional, of course; no definitive evidence of life after physical death, in any form, has been proved, but many believe, either as a result of personal experience, or a belief system, frequently but not exclusively religious, or both, that physical death is not the end of existence. However, the after-death impressions of the protagonist, Max, account for a very small section of this book, sandwiched between the long [and unnecessarily, tediously detailed] backstories of Max’s girlfriend and putative [but not realised] fiancée, her local friends and family back home in Australia. There are also sections of recent events involving both Max & Hannah, which painfully slowly, as a result of the disintegration of their relationship, indicate that marriage might not have been the best outcome for the couple, and how Max died. I confess that I skipped some of the backstory sections, because whilst I could see the relevance up to a point, I couldn’t see the significance of every little nuance of Hannah’s background, which didn’t have any effect on Max’s death, or as a result, explain why, other than understandable emotional attachment, he was apparently doomed to remain within the confines of their London flat; there is some speculation on that, but it just struck me as figurative hand-wringing [although Max does seem to have had some success at small-scale physical manifestation, especially with Hannah’s new cat]. Not my sort of book, I’m afraid. The paperback I read was published in 2025 by Vintage, part of the Penguin Random House group of companies, London [2024, Jonathan Cape], ISBN 978-1-5299-3169-3.

Being John Lennon, by Ray Connolly

John Lennon was many things: as well as being a twentieth century icon — ironic for an iconoclast — he was a real contradiction in terms, and this very comprehensive biography from the journalist Ray Connolly encapsulates A Restless Life, as the book is subtitled, very well. Connolly has written for several of the heavyweight national Press, but he also wrote screenplays for That’ll be the Day and its sequel, Stardust. He had chance to interview Lennon many times during his music career, but inevitably, the majority of this highly detailed book concerns Lennon’s time with the Beatles, from his creation of the group, moving on to his beloved rock & roll from the fading skiffle of the Quarry Men, to the acrimonious disintegration of the massively successful Liverpool foursome and his subsequent solo[ish] career, one of the prime causes being the catalyst of his relationship with the widely disliked Yoko Ono. It is quite possible that this book, and its subject, would only have any relevance for people born before the new millennium [or possibly even earlier], but I make no apologies for that; neither do I apologise for using Connolly’s summation of Lennon, because in a few lines, it describes Lennon very well, from someone who knew him personally: “Though millions who didn’t know him loved him, sometimes those who knew him well didn’t always like him. A natural leader, who could so easily be led and who saw himself as a chameleon, he was at various times a clever, witty, angry, funny, sharp-tongued, far-sighted, impetuous, talented, guilt-laden, preaching, sardonic, exaggerating, gullible, aggressive, unfaithful, obsessive, self-absorbed, outspoken, jealous, sometimes cruel but often generous man. He was certainly no saint, but, as his friends remember, it was difficult not to like him. Above all, he was absolutely a one-off.”. An excellent and absorbing read for music-lovers. The paperback I read was first published in the UK in 2019 [2018] by Weidenfeld & Nicolson, an imprint of Orion Books Ltd, London, ISBN 978-1-4746-0682-0.