Bad Boy by Peter Robinson
Published by Hodder & Stoughton
Trade Paperback, 405 pages
ISBN: 978 0 340 83696 5
Reviewed by: Gaile Hughes
Bad Boy, by the inimitable British author Peter Robinson, is another great sojourn into the adventures and misadventures of Detective Chief Inspector Alan Banks. If you like your crime ‘British’ and haven’t read Robinson’s books this is the perfect introduction for you.
Our introspective Chief Inspector is on leave in the US after another failed relationship and the traumas of his last case. His partner and ex-lover DI Annie Cabbot is left holding the fort.
A former neighbour of Banks, Juliet Doyle arrives at Eastvale Police Station in an agitated state seeking his help. Annie persuades her to explain her dilemma. Juliet confides that her daughter Erin arrived home unexpectantly a few days ago. When cleaning her daughter’s room she discovered a hidden loaded gun.
Knowing that, the possession of which carries a mandatory five year sentence, a conflicted Annie reports this, and an armed response team swoops into the quiet court and things go drastically wrong.
Annie is then thrown in the deep end, when she discovers that Banks’ daughter Tracey shares a house with Erin in Leeds. Tracey, now known as Francesca has made more changes to her life than just her name. She has disappeared with Erin’s boyfriend Jaff, who is charming, handsome, cashed up and Tracey finds him irresistible. He is also a bad boy and the possible owner of the gun.
Annie is faced with conflicting loyalties as things spiral quickly out of control. Banks returns from his holiday to find his daughter and Annie facing very different life threatening situations. He and Annie are plunged into the most dangerous and terrifying case that intertwines their personal lives and the professional careers as never before.
Although Banks is absent for the first half, it doesn’t distract the reader from the story. So adept is Robinson in his narrative that the reader is unaware. The few glimpses of Banks, has him at his complicated best, always questioning, and never truly finding happiness. A nice offset to Banks’ often introspective and dour character are his musical tastes. This will often send readers in search of the music so beloved by Banks.
Set in the picturesque and sometimes brooding rugged Yorkshire Dales, the locale is a perfect foil for Robinson’s character DCI Banks. The story is the nineteenth featuring Banks and is a well-crafted thriller with as many twists and turns as the Yorkshire countryside. It is powerful, atmospheric with a great sense of pace. As a stand-alone the reader would find Robinson’s Bad Boy an enthralling novel.
The series has recently been dramatized for television under the title DCI Banks, and stars Stephen Tompkinson as Banks.
August 15th, 2011 at 11:37 pm
Nice first review Gaile
best
MDP