To The Last Page

Variations on Robert Louis Stevenson’s Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde story are commonplace, or at least its theme about the duality of human nature and its capacity for evil is influential on much of crime fiction, but what can Craig Russell bring to the subject that is new? Well in some ways, Hyde is a companion piece or expansion of how Russell treated similar themes in his last book The Devil Aspect . That rip-roaring Gothic adventure managed to blend vampire mythology with East European folklore and hints of the dark side of Nazism in its 1935 setting. The “devil aspect” theory suggested that the potential for madness lies in all of us and with the right trigger applied, those most susceptible can be pushed towards acts of great evil. Hyde seems the obvious way to explore this issue further, but you can expect that Russell will similarly bring a new and thrilling twist to the classic story. What is immediately noticeable about the story is how Russell brings it back to the Scottish orig...

Craig Russell is well-known for his dark crime fiction writing, but The Devil Aspect must surely be his more ambitious and entertaining work yet, moving out of detective fiction for an even darker ride through Gothic historical fiction and mythology that takes us from Veles the Slavic God of the Underworld to Jack the Ripper, from the Gates of Hell to the origins of the Holocaust, and later even a little bit further than that. There’s an irresistible dark fascination to The Devil Aspect right from the outset, where a dangerous maniac known as Leather Apron has just killed his fourth victim on the streets of Prague, his methods similar to the Jack the Ripper killings in Whitechapel. In Prague in 1935 however, there almost seems to be an epidemic of madness and mental breakdown on the streets as Dr Vikor Kosárek arrives in the city. He’s about to take up a post as clinical psychiatrist in the Hrad Orlů asylum, a castle with a dark past that currently houses just six inmates. These inma...

The mean streets of Glasgow in the 1950s serve as a fine post-war setting for Craig Russell’s hard-edged noir. A tough no-nonsense Private Investigator, Lennox is more than capable of looking after himself, but it so happens in this case that he has the Three Kings, the crime kingpins who have the city carved up between themselves, watching out for his back. Normally Lennox would be more careful of the company he keeps, but in this case he doesn’t really have much of a choice, not if he wants to keep his toes attached to his feet. There’s another outfit in town throwing their weight around, picking off some of the smaller players in town, Lennox finding himself involved whether he likes it or not. Nothing however really adds up, and no matter what angle the detective looks at it, it’s a messy business involving blackmail, prostitution, pornography, property and shady import-export dealings. Even some heavy backing might not be enough to keep Lennox from taking a long walk off a short b...