Crime In Brief: Ask the Parrot
Blind Spot
The Strangler
Sunday, 1 April 2007
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Ask the Parrot by Richard Stark (QUERCUS £10 £10 (P&P FREE) 08700 798 897)
Richard Stark is the doyen of the modern hard-boiled crime novel. I have every one of his novels. His anti-hero Parker is a modern day outlaw. His motto: kill 'em all and let God sort them out. This time, Parker is on the run after a bank heist goes wrong, and falls in with a man with a plan. A plan for another robbery, which stinks of amateur hour - but Parker needs a friend, and agrees to participate, even though he knows there's no chance. Or is there? Read Ask The Parrot, and find out why Stark is the kind of writer who, whatever else you're reading, you stop dead and read his latest.
Blind Spot by Terri Parsons (CENTURY £10 £10 (P&P FREE) 08700 798 897)
Second sight is a terrible thing. Bernadette Saint Clare knows that. She's an FBI agent who has the gift - or is it a curse? She sees through murderers' eyes and solves cases. But she scares people and, every time she uses her powers, she gets sent to a worse posting. Eventually, she ends up in Minnesota, a sort of grave yard for agents, where her boss encourages her to use her talents as they track down a killer. But there's much more to this book than that, as Bernadette begins to see more and more ghosts... I loved Blind Spot, and can't wait for more books featuring Bernadette and her spirits.
The Strangler by William Landay (BANTAM PRESS £12.99 £11.99 (P&P FREE) 08700 798 897
November 1963: Kennedy assassinated in Dallas, and, in Boston, The Strangler is on the loose. So are the Daley boys, one a cop, one a lawyer, one a thief. Cocks of the walk one and all. The women of the city are in the grip of fear, 13 of them raped, strangled and posed in obscene ways. Then someone close to the Daley family becomes another victim and the boys' world slowly falls apart. Landay paints a convincing picture of the time and place, as Boston is regenerated from slums to shiny skyscrapers. He's been touted as the natural successor to George V Higgins, and I agree. A dense and satisfying novel of crime and retribution.
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