Features

CIS: The novels of Ted Lewis, a doomed genius

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What is it about brilliant writing and alcohol? Men like Faulkner, Thomas, Poe, Chandler, Capote, Hemingway and Joyce were no stranger to the bottle. Meanwhile, Patricia Highsmith said that strong drink enabled her to “…see the truth, the simplicity, and the primitive emotions once more.” One…
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Features

CIS: June Wright, Australia's queen of crime

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“Our very own Agatha Christie,” claims a quote from the Sydney Morning Herald on the cover of June Wright’s Duck Season Death, written in 1955 but only just published. In post-war Australia, June Wright’s mystery novels famously outsold even Christie’s, and yet by Wright’s death…
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News

Suicide in Santa Monica?

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On the Radar — Our lead book this week takes us out to the sunny LA suburb of Santa Monica but if the gruesome deaths there are too hot to handle, then there are chills aplenty too. Yes, we have ghostly chills in a haunted…
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iBookKindlePrintReviews

Tennison by Lynda La Plante

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Jane Tennison, a young policewoman fresh out of Hendon Training College, makes the daily journey from her parents’ comfortable flat in Maida Vale to Hackney. It’s a grim place and resolutely working class. Being a woman police constable in 1972 – the gender distinction was…
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Features

CIS: My classics by Luke Delaney

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For 16 years, Luke Delaney was a member of the Metropolitan Police in London, mainly in CID. He worked in some of the roughest areas of South London, investigating everything from gangland violence through to serial killers. To this day, his identity needs to remain a secret,…
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