Blackout by
Campbell Armstrong
hbk out May 98
Published by Doubleday
at £9.99
Widower Gregory Samsa is driving along on a very wet night when a rabbit suddenly appears in his headlights. Without thinking he instinctively brakes skids and overturns the car. Miraculously he escapes with bumps and bruises but his passenger is thrown out and killed. She is a young prostitute.
Fearing for his reputation and the effect a scandal would have on his beloved teen-age daughter Darcy, he hides the girl's body and only after that does he call the police on his mobile. The big problem is that Samsa is himself a policeman and until this incident a trustworthy, law-abiding citizen.
Lee Boyle, on the other hand, is a small-time crook and pimp who lives with Almond, the girl killed in the accident. Boyle has a vicious brutal streak in his character which is made worse by his drug dependency. He is in the middle of the wheeling and dealing world of the criminal fraternity, owing thousands of dollars to one crook and being owed a few dollars by another small-time crook. As violence is meted out to Lee so he gives the same treatment to others.
Lieutenant Samsa tries to carry on working as normal with the able assistance of his colleague Eve Lassiter, but he finds himself weaving a more and more tangled web of fabrication.
Meanwhile Lee with the help of his "friends" is trying to find Almond. Once her body is discovered it becomes a hunt for her killer.
In BlackoutCampbell Armstrong has written an intriguing, exciting American cops and robbers story with a difference. This time the criminal is on the trail of the detective. The portrayal of Samsa with the insights into his feelings as the one moment of moral blackout leads him inexorably into deceiving everyone but himself is masterly. So too, is the development of Boyle's character as his drug dependency takes over his life. Blackout is a most unusual thriller which keeps the reader in suspense to the last page.
Blackout by
Campbell Armstrong