0733618979

The Walker

Submitted by Karen on

Author's Home Country: 
Australia
Category: 
Crime Fiction

Detective Briony Williams is a rookie appointed to an all-male team investigating a bizarre murder at the Anatomy School of Gresham College in Bloomsbury, and her superiors constantly make her feel left out. But a killer obsessed with following Jack the Ripper soon changes that.

Sub Genre: 
Police Procedural
ISBN: 
0733618979
Location: 
London
Series: 
Briony Williams
Publisher: 
Hodder Headline
Year of Publication: 
2004

THE WALKER - Jane R Goodall

Author Information
Book Title: 
The Walker
Author Name: 
Jane R Goodall
Author's Home Country: 
Australia
ISBN: 
0733618979
Series: 
Briony Williams
Categorisation
Category: 
Crime Fiction
Sub Genre: 
Police Procedural
Location: 
London
Publisher: 
Hodder Headline
Year of Publication: 
2004

Detective Briony Williams is a rookie appointed to an all-male team investigating a bizarre murder at the Anatomy School of Gresham College in Bloomsbury, and her superiors constantly make her feel left out. But a killer obsessed with following Jack the Ripper soon changes that.

Book Review: 

Jane Goodall's first book is The Walker, published originally in 2004 when it won the Ned Kelly for Best First Crime Novel.
 
Jane is a Brit, now living in Sydney and The Walker is based in London.
 
In 1967 a schoolgirl is the only witness to the killer, as they leave the train, having left behind an elderly woman's body, with her throat cut. Nell then moves to Australia with her parents, returning to London in 1971 as a University Student. She's been suffering panic attacks and required counselling ever since that day boarding the train.
 
In 1971 Detective Inspector Briony Williams is getting ahead in her career, seconded to the team tracking down a killer with a very theatrical streak. This killer arranges his victims' in twisted parodies of Hogarth's famous engravings, he sends body parts to the police with defiant messages and he's a very experienced anatomist. Shades of Jack the Ripper?
 
This is a very good book, particularly when you consider it's a first novel. It's got some good characters - both the female and male, a nicely paced plot and really interesting twists and turns. Very enjoyable.

MURDER AT THE FORTNIGHT - Steve J Spears

Author Information
Book Title: 
Murder at the Fortnight
Author Name: 
Steve J Spears
Author's Home Country: 
Australia
ISBN: 
0733618979
Series: 
Stella Pentangeli
Investigator Ng
Categorisation
Category: 
Crime Fiction
Publisher: 
Wakefield Press
Year of Publication: 
2003

Murder at The Fortnight is a darkly hilarious tale of murder, greed, fame and lust set squarely under the bright lights of the world of showbusiness. When celebs start dropping like flies at The Playwright's Fortnight, Stella and Ng must battle media hysteria and political backstabbing in their desperate search for a killer who keeps on killing. Who will be next?

Book Review: 

MURDER AT THE FORTNIGHT is set in the testing arena of the "theatre" and the arts. Showbiz commentator, Stella Pentangelli is returning from a bit of a "rest" as it's known in the trade, after a stella career as a showbusiness commentator and heavyweight. Inspector Ng is an investigator in the police, renowned for his different methods and for not paying the slightest bit of attention to all the whispering about his slightly bizarre methods.
 
Steve J Spears is a renowned Australian playright, and in MURDER AT THE FORTNIGHT he's created a wonderfully eccentric, slightly stagey set of characters resolving the murder of a major TV executive and then an internationally renowned and universally loved, indigenous actor at "The Fortnight". The Fortnight is a yearly "event" for the theatre community, reading and workshopping plays, in a university theatre town, a long way from civilisation.
 
There's nothing even slightly realistic in the police system described in MURDER AT THE FORTNIGHT, even allowing for Ng's slightly eccentric methodology and this lack of accuracy creates a very stagey, very elaborately set murder mystery in which the lives of the investigator's are as much part of the story as the investigation itself.
 
Lovely, unusual and enjoyable as long as you're not looking for gritty reality.
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