 |
When photographer Kate O'Donnell leaves Liverpool she has two things in mind: to make a career in the big city and to track down her older brother who made the same trip earlier and has not been heard of since. But a job proves easier to find than Tom and when she does find a trace of him he is still missing, leaving behind a dead flat-mate and some very suspicious cops. When Harry Barnard of the vice squad catches up with Kate, Tom's future looks grim. Kate's struggle to clear Tom's name in 1960s Soho and back home in the city of the Merseybeat, takes her on a terrifying journey into an underworld where no-one is quite what they seem. Her investigations upset powerful and violent men and she is not even sure the charming sergeant Barnard can be trusted. It is a terrifying leap from taking snaps in the Cavern Club to a gangsters' gala at the Delilah Club where death lurks beneath the tuxedos and she begins to fear for her life. Dead Beat is published by Creme de la Crime on May 26 2011.
Journalist Laura Ackroyd has more than usual going on in her personal life, and she could have done without profiling a wealthy venture capitalist who seems set on taking over the running of a local school. But she finds David Murgatroyd a charismatic, though elusive, subject and begins to wonder just what methods he is prepared to use to persuade people to fall into line with his plans. Meanwhile DCI Michael Thackeray, unaware he is likely to become a father again, is looking for a missing mother, whose disappearance reveals a far more sinister and dangerous reality than either he or Laura could have imagined. A tense and highly topical read.
Book Groups and Library talks
Patricia Hall is available to talk about her books either alone or with colleagues from Oxblood, an Oxford-based group of crime writers. E-mail for further deatils.
|
|
