Reviews

‘DAMAGE’ by Josephine Hart, 1991 So this is a bit of a departure from the usual crime fiction I tend to pick, but as I read it I realised it has many hallmarks of old-fashioned noir – sexual obsession, a feeling of dream-like displacement, and a prevailing sense of...

‘`The Golwulf Manuscript’ is the first in Robert B. Parker’s much-lauded and immensely popular Spenser series. Written in 1973 when Parker was still teaching literature for a day job, it introduces the world to his wise-cracking hard-as-nails sleuth Spenser (spelled with an ‘S’, like the English poet).

George Pelecanos’ classic ‘thieves falling out’ piece of urban noir.

‘The Neon Rain’ is the first in a long-standing series of crime books featuring Dave Robicheaux, one of my all-time favourite troubled investigators.

For those who don’t know of Edward Bunker, he was, alongside Chester Himes, perhaps the quintessential example of how the school of hard-knocks can produce some of the finest examples of convincing noir writing in the genre.

Ryu is a heralded Japanese cult novelist known for his strange, disturbing tales of violence and insanity, all set to a backdrop of late-night, neon-tinted Tokyo

For those unfamiliar with LB, he is one of the East Coast’s most prolific mystery writers, a winner of awards galore who has penned under various pseudonyms and in a variety of sub-genres