Picture Of Innocence by
Jill McGown
hbk out April 98
Published by Macmillan
at £16.99
Jill McGown’s Lloyd-and-Hill series is one of the enduring delights of British crime fiction. In A Picture of Innocence, her thirteenth novel, the story centres around a sadistic farmer, Bernard Bailey, a man with more mortal enemies than he knows what to do with. His farm is ringed with state-of-the-art security devices. Yet someone is sending him death threats, and somehow bypassing Bailey’s cordon to do so. Then his beautiful wife Rachel, returning from a shopping trip to London, stumbles on his bloodstained body, already decaying in an overheated room in the height of summer.
This is indeed superior crime fiction - rich in plausible suspects and satisfying plot twists, and even richer in its intelligent and compassionate characterisation. As usual, the criminal case unfolds in parallel with the often difficult personal relationship between Detective Chief Inspector Lloyd and Detective Inspector Judy Hill. Highly recommended.
(
Andrew Taylor
- author of the highly acclaimed Roth & Lydmouth Series)
