Laughing Boy by
Stuart Pawson
hbk out October 02
Published by Allison Busby
at £17.99
Detective Inspector Charlie Priest has more than one unsolved murder on his patch.
The killing of thirty-eight year old Laura Heeley and twenty- two year old Colinette
Jones don't have much in common. Laura was stabbed, Colinette, strangled but what
they do share is the apparent random nature of their deaths. Could the deaths be the
work of one man, varying his MO to fool the police? As the surrounding Yorkshire
countryside festers from the effects of foot and mouth disease Charlie and his team
enlist the help of a psychologist and even a contact in the FBI. An appeal to the killer
leads to the team receiving notes, apparent riddles which taunt the detectives, and
which connect to an obscure American rock group from the sixties. Laughing Boy is the eighth in the Charlie Priest series: satisfying police procedurals
with an agreeable hero who ponders upon the mysteries of life, large and small. The
scenes which give us glimpses of the killers could have been sustained further
throughout the book, they seem to peter out. However Pawson draws a fond portrait
of the police team and their daily lives. Strong on a sense of place, down to earth,
with a seam of dry, Yorkshire wit.
Manchester Evening News 14.12.02
(
Cath Staincliffe
author of the popular Sal Kilkenny mysteries set on the mean streets of Manchester)
