Book #49: Not Dead Enough by Peter James
Number of pages: 619
This is the third murder mystery thriller starring Roy Grace, and I've noticed now that the first two have been, or are going to be, serialised on ITV, and I'm curious to see if I overlooked this, or if it is yet to be screened. I was surprised at the casting of John Simm in the lead role, just because of him being older than the character he is playing (supposed to be 39 in this book).
This book felt more like a straightforward serial killer novel to begin with; two murders took place near to the start, connected by one man, who happened to be married to the first victim, and was apparently having an affair with the second.
In this case, the narrative seemed to be trying to pinpoint the husband as the killer quite early on, and when this sort of thing happens, it usually means there is more to it than meets the eye. I was getting a shrewd idea of what was really going on before I got even halfway through this book, but thanks to some neat double bluffing, I found myself constantly being surprised at the book reached its denouement.
The book made clear quite early on whenever the killer chose his next target, so it ended up being just a matter of finding out when or where they would end up being murdered. In this book, the stakes got a bit higher by having the killer target a recurring character.
There were a few other plot strands; one of them involved another detective being kicked out of his marital home and having to stay at Grace's house, which didn't have much impact on the main plot. There was also a subplot about a drug addict who was stealing cars for their parts, which was almost entirely disconnected from the plot, until the two storylines dovetailed into eachother in a way that felt mildly contrived.
The book also gave more weight to the recurring theme of Grace's missing wife, Sandy, by having her apparently sighted in Münich, resulting in him spending a portion of the book over there attempting to find her. Without saying too much, this book doesn't entirely wrap up this plotline, but it did further the relationship between Grace and his colleague Cleo that was referenced in at least one of the first two titles.
I already mentioned there was one plot contrivance, but apart from the killer having a petty reason for choosing one of his intended victims, I enjoyed this book, and will make sure I read the next title, Dead Man's Footsteps at some point, and make sure I get to see the TV show at some point.
Next book: Agatha Raisin and the Wellspring of Death (M.C. Beaton)