Quintus Huntley: Botany, Royce Leville

I was having a bit of a chat with a fellow lover of crime fiction (hi Gavin) on BlueSky who copied me in on an instagram post that outed the author of this novel as Campbell Jeffreys, a writer with a diverse background in literature, media and film, and the author of (amongst other things) a thriller entitled BALACLAVA which is now on the TO BE READ teetering piles. Because, if at any point you think that QUINTUS HUNTLEY: BOTANY (written under the author name of Royce Leville) sounds unlikely, park the concerns, grab yourself a copy and get stuck in.

This is the sort of dry, humorous, social commentary that is so far up my alley, and pitched perfectly, that it very nearly made me turn off the cricket so I could concentrate. It's the story of poet, and all round endearingly slightly, maybe not really so, hopeless case, poet come university lectuter Quintus Huntley (the name comes with commune territory); ex-punk-rock drummer, now detective Elenore Everest (now desperately want a YouTube Music channel for Salty Lemonade); PR writer come poet at heart Aphra Massey (who works for the wrong side and is all too aware of that); and octogenarian EV driver and computer hacker Henrickson (now there's a man that could carry a novel in his own right!). Great cast in other words, I mean even Everest's sidekick - of nepo-baby fame, mid-20's for goodness sake, and definitely slightly dodgy Justin Booth is okay. In the small doses allocated to him herein.

The plot revolves around a series of deaths (and one coma), all connected by the plants that are used to poison each victim. Each plant is a tad on the obscure side, and the methods of death (and coma) just odd enough to go down as one murder, one suicide, one accident and one natural causes (I think that's the combo, I was laughing a lot by then and yes I know that sounds ... odd), but the plot was clever, and funny, and nicely twisty and best of all not everything gets resolved the way it should, and the higher-ups stick the oars in when they should be minding the sinking ship, and the caravan living lifestyle fits with the idea that Huntley grew up in a very eclectic family on a very hilariously established commune, and there's connections between the Perth of the current day - all developers at the cost of environment, and populist opportunistic politics, and the drug wars behind some of it, and the political machinations over WA becoming a country in its own right, and the money, corruption and influence. To say nothing of who is sleeping with who. You might want to make notes, it all gets very complicated, but never confusing, it gets very serious, but never loses the sense of tongues firmly pressed into cheeks, and the poet(s), the cop who was a punk, and the old man with his incontinence support, his book shop and his hacking skills, all combine to save the day. Sort of.

Right from the get go I loved QUINTUS HUNTLEY: BOTANY. It worked on the humorous level, it worked as a piece of crime fiction out to solve some crimes, and it worked as a bit of sly social commentary. It worked because the cast of characters is brilliant, but there was more than enough plot to allow them to shine, and it worked because it was quirky and very unexpected and I now I want the next book in the series.