The Strange Death Of Fiona Griffiths by Harry Bingham
Publisher: Orion
Genre: Contemporary, Mystery/Suspense/Thriller
Rating: 4 stars
Reviewed by Fern

A woman starved to death in a remote Welsh cottage. A computer guy left to bleed to death, his hands brutally hacked off at the wrist.

When DC Fiona Griffiths and her colleagues realise they’re staring at one of the world’s most audacious robberies, she’s asked to take on the challenge: will she go undercover to penetrate this criminal gang from within?

When Fiona says yes, she has to give up her old life entirely. She becomes Fiona Grey, a homeless woman struggling to get her life back together again. When the criminal gang adopt her as one of their own, she’s totally alone, vulnerable – and dangerous as hell.

DC Fiona Griffiths is desperate to be a real member of Planet Normal, to be just like everyone else. But after completing the police force’s undercover training in an exceptional manner, the lure of undercover work is too strong for her to resist. Especially when what was thought to be a minor level of payroll fraud is shown to be the tip of a very large criminal iceberg and two dead bodies are connected to it, Fiona finds herself wading as far as ever from her regular life and all those links to the normalcy she craves.

I have been very much enjoying this series and found this to be an exceptional book. Fiona is a very non-standard character. I love that she is extremely complicated and multi layered, and with her dual persona’s – her “real” self as well as her undercover self – that is even more exacerbated than usual in this book. I thought this book was quite gritty and even hard/difficult in places. Fiona is a complicated woman even under good circumstances, so under this kind of pressure and case there are a number of parts where I felt for her very deeply. Somehow even with this difficulty there seems to be a spark that keeps the book from feeling too bleak of uncompromising. I love how the author very carefully navigated this as a whole.

While I admit I loved this book, I strongly feel this won’t appeal to all readers. Readers looking for something a bit more cosy, or even a bit more regular police procedural might find some of the complexities a bit too grey for them. I have always found Fiona’s character to be opaque and nuanced and that is very much more strongly present in this book. Being undercover this “shades of grey” sense is even more front and centre than it usually is and I’m not sure that makes for very comfortable or easy reading. Readers should absolutely be aware of this going in.

I do love though how even when things are complicated I never held any doubt that Fiona wanted the bad people put away and wanted justice for the dead. Having that as a strong and solid guideline helped keep the worst of the shadows at bay and helped keep this book from being too dark, in my opinion. Knowing that this was at the core and instrumental in all of Fiona’s actions helped me ease back a bit and enjoy the ride, bumpy though it was.

Readers looking for a very different style of edgier and darker mystery book should find this as gripping and enjoyable as I did. Recommended.

The Cut by George Pelecanos
Publisher: Orion
Genre: Contemporary, Mystery/Suspense/Thriller
Rating: 4 stars
Reviewed by Fern

Crime fiction writer George Pelecanos introduces Spero Lucas, an anti-hero making his place in the world one battle at a time. Includes a bonus work of short fiction focusing on Spero’s early life.

Spero Lucas has a new line of work. Since he returned home to Washington, D.C. after serving in Iraq, he has been doing special investigations for a defense attorney. He’s good at it, and he has carved out a niche: recovering stolen property, no questions asked. His cut is forty percent.

A high-profile crime boss who has heard of Lucas’s specialty hires him to find out who has been stealing from his operation. It’s the biggest job Spero has ever been offered, and he quickly gets a sense of what’s going on. But before he can close in on what’s been taken, he tangles with a world of men whose amorality and violence leave him reeling. Is any cut worth your family, your lover, your life?

Spero Lucas has served his country and after returning home discovered he wasn’t suited to more steady or a regular job. Instead he does small investigations and – his specialty – retrieving lost or stolen items. The deal though is he always takes a cut – usually forty percent of the value of the item he recovers. It’s been working just fine for him until what should have been another simple retrieval turns out to be a lot more complicated than Spero estimated.

I really enjoyed this gritty and gripping mystery story. This is the first book I’ve read by George Pelecanos and by about half way through I had ordered both the sequel to this book and two other books that begin different series of his. I loved the writing style – brief and gritty, almost a noir or hard-boiled sort of style. This won’t be to everyone’s tastes as there are some things Pelecanos will dwell and on and describe quite well – like clothing, music or books – but other more regular things (for example like landscapes or decorations, items readers often use to paint their own mental picture of what’s occurring) that aren’t as fully fleshed out. This didn’t bother me as much as I thought it might as the pace is kept moving at quite a decent clip and I was rushing along beside Spero trying to work out what was happening.

Readers who like a decent pace, plenty of action and a number of really strong secondary characters along with a good, solid plot should find this book really fits with what they’re wanting. I really enjoyed it – finding the plot tightly woven, the characters vivid and interesting enough to keep my attention and Spero an interesting and layered character. I was also pleased he wasn’t the classical loner style of gritty noir detective – he had a decent sized family and was particularly close with his brother. Spero also enjoyed and appreciated the ladies he came into contact with and he had an interesting enough personality that he could spend time with pretty much anyone. I really enjoyed this and found it added appreciably to the story.

With a lovely twisty plot (but nothing unrealistic or too outrageous), good characters and plenty of supporting people plus a lovely noir/gritty tone of voice this was a great book and one I know I will enjoy reading again in the future. Recommended.