Jonathan Gash

Page Updated: 30/11/03

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Jonathan Gash - Page 2

Prey Dancing

The Rich and the Profane

Different Women Dancing

The Possessions of a Lady

Paperback - Pan (1999)

Prey Dancing

In her dying moments, Marie was brave. 'Tell Jase one word, Dr Burtonall, please.’ ‘Yes, Marie. What?’ ‘Tell him forgive.’

Marie Cullokin was eighteen, a drug addict and street-dweller. To some, her final message might have seemed hardly worth passing on. But Dr Glare Burtonall believes in the value of the small things in life. She determines to find Jase and speak the dead girl's word to him. Who knew what it might mean out there on the streets?
But Jase proves elusive. Clare enlists the help of her hired lover Bonn, the sensitive young man who operates a group of gigolos for the Pleases Agency. He is all too familiar with the city's criminal underworld.
Unfortunately Jase is a weapons man for a gang of murderous yardies. And he blames Clare for Marie's death...
'A smashing new crime novel.’ New York Times Book Review
'Light years away from the jovial roguery which Gash has made his own, but just as distinctive.' Literary Review

First British Edition Macmillan (1998)

Paperback - Pan (1999)

The Rich and the Profane
See Review by Frances Hickey
It could only happen to Lovejoy one minute a beautiful young girl is asking him how to steal a cheap Edwardian necklace; the next he's jetting off to the Channel Isles, posing as a showbiz impresario, organizing 'The Gamble of the Century' - and avenging a murder…
Prior George Metivier and his sister Marie need Lovejoy's help. The ancient Albansham Priory is in deep financial trouble, owing to George's heavy gambling debts, and they would like Lovejoy to suss out the Priory's valuable antiques. For research purposes, of course, Lovejoy and his friend Gesso the cat burglar break into the Priory at dead of night. Gesso is caught, but Lovejoy for once is lucky (he thinks) and escapes with a rare Roderick O'Conor painting.
But despite frantic attempts to conceal it, by morning the canvas has vanished from Lovejoy's derelict workshop. Only hours later Gesso, too, disappears, the Priory suddenly closes, and Prior George and his flock are gone.
Worse still, at the now eerily quiet Albansham Priory, Lovejoy finds evidence that Gesso has been murdered …

'Exceedingly witty… the best Lovejoy' Evening Standard
'Offers fun and thrills as the antique-dealing sleuth becomes involved in nefarious goings-on' Oxford Mail
'A positive tonic.' Literary Review
'A very stylish entry in the series… [Gash is] a master of top-notch narrative skill. On the evidence of this outing, the literary Lovejoy franchise is in no need of vitamin supplements.' Crime Time

Paperback - Pan (1998)

First British Edition Macmillan (1997)

Different Women Dancing
See Review by Andrew Taylor - author of the highly acclaimed Roth & Lydmouth Series
The Burtonalls are the perfect professional couple. Dr Glare Burtonall is a dedicated doctor, and her husband Clifford an influential property developer. Their lives are serene - until Glare stops to give assistance at a fatal road accident and her life changes for ever…
Bonn is an enigmatic young 'goer' - a male hired for pleasure by restless city women - who has recently been promoted to head his own team of men for the Pleases Agency. He too witnesses the accident and attends to the dying Leonard Mostern.
But was Mostern's death really an accident? Clare remembers him as a business associate of her husband - and when a battered briefcase, similar to the one the dead man was carrying, is furtively delivered to her house that evening her suspicions are aroused. Could Clifford's success, and her affluent life, actually be founded on murder... ?
The streetwise Bonn is the one person who can help her find the answer - and very quickly she is drawn into the precarious, tense underworld in which he moves ...
'Brilliantly successful: reminds you of Brighten Rock' Sunday Times
'A smashing new crime novel' New York Times Book Review
'Light years away from the jovial roguery which Gash has made his own, but just as distinctive' Literary Review
'A brilliant thriller.' Peterborough Evening Telegraph

First British Edition Century (1996)

The Possessions of a Lady
See Review by Val McDermid - Gold Dagger winner & creator of Lindsay Gordon, Kate Brannigan & Tony Hill
Ejected from Thekla Paumann's fashion show, peerless antiques divvy Lovejoy knows he's in trouble. Thekla has been paying all his bills, and he is broke.
Invited to dinner at the town's poshest eatery by the enticing but insane Faye, she promptly lands him in it with the local constabulary. Worse - Lovejoy has acquired a double, a rival divvy who beats him to the punch on every priceless antique, and his fake Norwich School Painting won't even sell in Norwich. Tinker's cousin's girl is missing and Lovejoy has to find her and expose a donty - insider trading at an auction (expression coined by one Lovejoy, 1992).
No one is innocent in antiques is his only conclusion. He flees North to get the antique that will stave of his creditors. Then his second dictum Never go back comes into play as, following a path of murder and attempted murder (on himself), he is once more in the childhood streets of his memory.
Brief fame follows as he conducts an auction, finds the girl and cracks the case. Throw in the infamous Berkley horse flagellation frame, enough fake prehistoric bones to construct a respectable Neanderthal family and you have an irresistible romp through the magical, mad world of antiques with the most roguish dealer of them all.
With a mixture of fast-paced action, colourful characters and an unrivalled knowledge of the antiques trade, Jonathan Gash will again delight his millions of fans. The last Lovejoy novel, , is now available in Arrow paperback.
Of The Grace In Older Women
'Excellent writing, intellectual puzzlement of the highest order and gentle thrills… if you have only sampled the roguish antiques dealer on television, it's certainly worth trying the real thing' time Out
'Breathless… a hectic read' Sunday Times