To The Last Page

After a strenuous sex session in the Lincoln Room with Actress/Singer/International Celebrity Babatte Van Anka, the President returns to his wife’s bed and is found there dead the next morning by the Secret Service with the imprint of silver spitoon indented into his forehead. The First Lady, Elisabeth MacMann (known as Lady BethMac), has had a stormy relationship because of her husband's infidelities and was heard rowing with him on the night of his death. She is charged (somewhat improbably) with his murder and hires “Shameless” Boyce Baylor, the most notorious lawyer in America and the man she dumped 25 years earlier to marry Ken MacMann, to defend her in what will certainly become the “Trial of the Millennium”. Bam! That’s two chapters and 13 pages into the book - no messing around here. There is nothing fancy or clever about the writing style or the dialogue - it is effective, straightforward and to the point. There is nothing sophisticated either about the plot, which after h...

Ken McNutt is a radio DJ for Capital Live!, a controversial and outspoken presenter who uses his program as a platform for airing his views on world current affairs, everything from Palestine to football. The book opens with a wedding reception, one of the traditional methods of introducing us to a wide cast of characters (Banks has already used the funeral at the start of The Crow Road ), various friends and ex-lovers of Ken, who are gathered to celebrate the wedding of his friends Kul and Faye at their apartment in Canary Wharf. As the party falls into riotous behaviour, we become aware of the significance of the day. It is September 11th 2001. The title Dead Air  comes from the description of London airspace in the immediate period after Sept 11, when flights were diverted from flying over London, an ominous and portentously unsettling time, during which Ken is not afraid to court controversy with his attacks on George W Bush. It also refers to a pause on the radio when there is...

I think it’s fair to say that I’m a fan of Tom Holland’s books. I’ve read The Vampyre , Deliver Us From Evil  and Sleeper In The Sands  (haven’t read Attis  or Sleeping With Panthers , but must try and get to them sometime) and found each book surpassing the achievements of the previous. Although thematically different, each has a supernatural theme, each one is based on historical characters or based in a particular period and the amount of research done has been evident but not intrusive - he never displays his facts and research just for the sake of it (like Dan Simmons seems to do increasingly), but to add mood and colour to his descriptions and characters. The progress in his books has been exciting to watch – the plots becoming more complex and unconventional, but always remaining gripping with extremely well-written dialogue and prose. So maybe it’s because I had such high expectations from a new Tom Holland novel that I found myself disappointed with The Bone Hunt...

It is 1862. Sue is an orphan, her mother hanged for murder, who has been brought up by Mrs Sucksby and her little gang of thieves. She’s a “fingersmith”, a pickpocket. One of the gang “Gentleman” has a plan to marry a lady, Maud Lilly – the niece of a man he is binding prints for, who is the heiress to a great fortune. Sue is employed as a maid to Maud Lilly, to help Gentleman elope with her and, when the time comes, leave her in a madhouse and take her inheritance. For this Sue is promised £2,000. Engaged as Maud’s maid, Sue comes to feel a certain sympathy for poor Maud – a frail, poor sensitive girl, who has barely seen beyond the manor she lives in, assisting her uncle to catalogue and index his vast collection of books. As she suffers from nightmares, Sue sleeps in the same bed as Maud to keep her company and a mild sexual relationship develops. Nevertheless, in spite of her feelings for her mistress, she thinks of the money she will earn and helps Gentleman escape with Maud and q...