Rating: 4/5
Review:
An enjoyable thriller
I enjoyed this book. It is s very decently plotted crime novel set in Glasgow in 1946. I hadn't read the first in the series, but that didn't interfere with my enjoyment because anything relevant from the first book is neatly explained where necessary. The plot itself is well summarised elsewhere on this page, and I found it reasonably plausible and comprehensible. The characters are well drawn and believable, the sense of place is strong and the prose is unfussy and easy to read.
The difficulty I had with the book was the language used. Told in the first person, the narration and dialogue are liberally strewn with 21st century vocabulary and phraseology - "choice of lifestyle", "As if!", "paper trail" and many other examples - which hadn't been invented in 1946 and there is also a strong infusion of 21st century attitudes, so that I found little sense of period here. However, the book was well enough written to engage me throughout and, despite the obligatory slightly silly Big Climax, I would recommend this as an enjoyable and reasonably original thriller.
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