London

OUR LADY OF PAIN is the second novel from English writer Elena Forbes - her first DIE WITH ME received a much deserved nomination for the Crime Writers' Association John Creasey New Blood Dagger award.

This book picks up with the same investigation team headed by DI Mark Tartaglia and DS Sam Donovan, called in when a most bizarrely "displayed" body is found in a snow covered London park. The naked corpse of a young woman is kneeling down, her head bent right over touching the ground, her face almost hidden beneath a tangle of pale blonde hair. Identified finally as a wealthy, seemingly very normal West End Art dealer, there is a much darker side to the victim which her friends and family don't make it easy to unveil.

OUR LADY OF PAIN has a similar feeling to the first book, the investigation takes place in the freezing cold of a London Winter, the subject matter is often dark and there's a dismal and almost lost feel to the lives led by just about all the suspects, witnesses and the victim. All of that lends a subdued, dark, sad feeling to many of the characters who are frequently damaged people. Not so the two main lead characters who lead relatively normal lives (especially compared to many police characters in Crime Fiction in general). They are both single, and there is a spark of romantic interest, slightly one-sided perhaps, but it's not overplayed and it is not used as a source of ongoing angst. There's something very realistic about the way that the relationship between Mark and Sam is portrayed and there's something refreshingly normal about both of them. Sam has a happy home life, sharing a house with her sister, they are close and the only thing that's overtly wrong there is a worrying inability to cook. Mark has a good relationship with his own family, despite his sister's ongoing attempts to pair him off with all her own female friends, he cooks, he lives in a normal home, clean and furnished, and well - normal.

It's partly the balance of all these elements that really make this book work, as they did in the first novel incidentally. It's also helped by sound police procedural elements, alongside a strong plot. The plot is reasonably fairly laid out giving fans of puzzle solving a chance of working out the outcome, although the final resolution is not as obvious as you could be forgiven for thinking it was going to be.

I really liked the first book - DIE WITH ME - and I was wondering how the second book would rate, given the class act it had to follow. OUR LADY OF PAIN held up really well, and kept the series ticking along nicely. I hope there's a third and many more outings with DI Tartaglia and DS Donovan.

THE ART THIEF is crime fiction where the crime is not murder or mayhem.  The author of this book is (from his blurb) considered the world's leading expert on the history and study of art crime, so the point of this book seems to be to explore the nature and motivation for high profile art thefts and forgery.

There is a rather complicated plotline going on here.  Firstly an altarpiece disappears in Rome.  A valuable, renowned abstract painting is stolen in Paris from the vaults of the society charged with protecting the legacy of the painter Malevich.  Then a new Malevich acquisition is stolen in London, after a lot of chicanery with the computerised alarm systems of the gallery.  Now where things get really complicated is whether or not the painting stolen in Paris is the same painting that was purchased in London, and if it was - which one is the forgery?  Or are both of them forgeries?  It's possibly a little hard to tell as the paintings are all famous examples of White on White. 

Inspector Jean-Jacques Bizot is leading the investigation in Paris, helped by the curator of the Malevich Society, Genevieve Delacloche, whilst Inspector Harry Wickenden is in London, assisted by National Gallery chief Elizabeth van der Mier. There is also art expert and former Carabinieri officer Gabriel Coffin who is attempting to track down the missing altarpiece from Rome.  All of this occurs in a welter of anonymous phone calls, obscure biblical quotes and other clues, fake Malevichs, hugely self-indulgent gourmet feasts (Paris of course), and tea and austere living (London of course).  Confused?

Lurking deep within this book there were some highlights.  Obviously the author knows a lot about art theft, and some of the aspects of that knowledge were interesting.  The problem really is that the plot gets convoluted and there were times when I felt I needed a mindmap to keep track of the who, what, where, when and whys.   There was definitely some humour in some of the characterisations but there was also caricature - the French gourmand was frequently too gross, the English tea drinking Inspector too ascetic.

THE ART THIEF definitely provides an interesting glimpse into the world of Art Theft, and for those looking for a crime fiction book that provides some education about that, then this will definitely be the book for you.  It could also appeal to somebody looking for a yarn, with a zero body count.

STRATTON'S WAR is the first in an new planned series of crime novels featuring Ted Stratton, a Detective Inspector in the London police during the Second World War.  This book includes a second protagonist - Diana Calthorp, young, socialite, not long and unhappily married and unexpected MI5 agent, involved in a covert operation against sympathisers and spies in the local community. 

It's a very elaborate, multi-layered story.  The death of a silent film star who hasn't worked for many years is the starting point.  It's an investigation that Ted cannot put aside, despite a verdict of suicide.  Diana starts work as a clerical assistant in MI5 but soon finds herself infiltrated into a group of well-to-do and well-known people, suspected of being Fascist sympathisers or spies.  There's Ted's own family situation - a loving relationship with his wife, made tense by the evacuation of their two young children.  There's the brother-in-law that Ted really struggles to deal with, and a problem nephew.  Diana has gotten herself into a very unhappy marriage, with an overbearing and controlling mother-in-law, her husband is now serving in the Armed Forces.  Diana's romantic liaison with another MI5 operative - a known womaniser - despite all the warnings that he's not to be trusted, despite threats from her mother-in-law, makes her realise she doesn't want to be married to her husband anymore.

The book weaves its way through all of the various threads of investigation and private life as it slowly draws a complicated web of crimes, espionage and the personal, slowly to the point where Diana and Ted's paths cross and the realisation that the Underworld and the Secret Service operate in very similar ways. 

The thing that made STRATTON'S WAR really work for me was the way that there were multiple threads and a strong dose of the personal throughout the book.  Some readers may find that less satisfactory, but for this reader, it created an atmosphere - a world if you want, that the characters inhabit.  Some readers might find Diana's affair and the concentration on her personal feelings annoying (and I will agree she was a bit dangerously close to being whiny in places), but she's a young woman, in a weird time in the world, and it illustrated that she was a very young, inexperienced woman - one of the least likely people called upon to perform the most unlikely duty in the middle of war.  The crime investigation, conducted within the background of a war, with nights spent in air-raid shelters, police stations being bombed into oblivion, and an old body being revealed in the bombed out remains of a church starkly revealed that even in extraordinary times, in the middle of a war, local criminals continue operations and family relationships remain complicated.

STRATTON'S WAR won the 2008 CWA Ellis Peters Historical Award.  The award is given to the best historical crime novel (set in any period up to 35 years prior to the year in which the award will be made) by an author of any nationality.

BYE BYE BABY is a very thick book. At just over 500 pages, perhaps too thick. 

The basic plot is pretty good, but there seems to be just a little too much window dressing.  Jack is attractive to women, his past problems demonstrate that. His deputy, DI Kate Carter has a crush on him and is extremely jealous of attention he pays to any other female, despite the fact she is engaged to be married.  I didn't like this particular plot thread, I felt it detracted from the story and made a character central to the book unlikeable when she didn't need to be. And perhaps its a sign of the author's inexperience with the crime fiction genre that many plot developments are telegraphed to the reader long before the police discover the clues. At times I felt like shouting at them not to be so dopey.

That aside, BYE BYE BABY differs from many books dealing with serial killers. There are shades of grey in this book which are missing from most other books with a similar theme. 

Lauren Crow is a nom de plume for Fantasy author Fiona Macintosh who is making her first foray into crime fiction.