Banks is on holiday, headed for Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco. His daughter, Tracy, home in Leeds and angry with her father, is headed for some very deep trouble. Robinson's nineteenth Inspector Banks novel is a stunner.
Handguns are illegal in the U.K., and whenever one is reported, the police swing into high gear. But things go very wrong when the police swoop down on a home in Eastvale to seize a reported handgun. In the confusion, Patrick Doyle, a former neighbour of Banks, is shot. Doyle's daughter, Erin, is to blame for the gun being in the house, and while she's in police custody, her housemate in Leeds, Tracy Banks, decides to let Erin's boyfriend know that the police have been around their place. Bad decision. When Banks returns home from holiday, Tracy is missing. And that's not the worst of it.
Robinson's latest Inspector Banks novel is a powerful story of how the volatile emotions of love and resentment can turn deadly when fear comes creeping in.
"Robinson deftly integrates Banks's personal life with an acute look at British attitudes about police, guns, and violence in this strong entry in a superb series."
- Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Just try putting the book down after a chapter or so: you'll have a problem."
-The Independent
"Robinson's writing is clear and clean, like a running stream. However, like a stream, there are also distortions, eddies and hidden perils at play. . . . If you like intelligent mysteries and love a good read, join me as new inductees in the Peter Robinson/Alan Banks fan club. It will be well worth our while."
-Toronto Sun
"It is this warts-and-all portrayal of lives on the brink that makes Robinson among the best there is in modern crime fiction."
- Edmonton Journal
"Once again, an experienced and accomplished writer demonstrates how even a long-established series character can grow and change as altered circumstances demand."
- reviewingtheevidence.com PETER ROBINSON is the recipient of numerous awards for his Inspector Banks novels, including the prestigious Grand Prix de Littérature Policière for the French translation of In a Dry Season, the Edgar Award for the short story "Missing in Action," Denmark's Palle Rosenkrantz Award, and several Arthur Ellis best novel awards. In 2002 he was awarded the Dagger in the Library by the British Crime Writers Association. In 2006 he was invited to join the exclusive and prestigious Detection Club, founded in 1928 by a group of mystery writers, including Agatha Christie, Dorothy Sayers, and G.K. Chesterton. Robinson was born in Yorkshire, England, and immigrated to Canada after graduating from the University of Leeds. He earned an MA in English and Creative Writing at the University of Windsor, with Joyce Carol Oates as his tutor, then a PhD in English at York University. He funds a scholarship at the University of Leeds for low-income students who want to be writers, and now divides his time between Toronto and Richmond, Yorkshire. 1
By the end of August, the waterlogged Yorkshire countryside was a symphony of green and gold under a blue sky scribbled with white clouds. Heaven only knew how the farmers had managed to mow and bale the hay, as the rain seemed to have fallen for days without end, but somehow they had succeeded, and their neat straw cylinders dotted the fields. Bright tractors ploughed in the stubble and turned the earth a dark, fecund brown. Smells of the recent harvest and of the coming autumn chill mingled in the mild air. On the moors, the purple heather was in bloom. By the roadside, swallows gathered on the telephone wires preparing for their long flight to South Africa.
Annie Cabbot wished she could go with them as she drove the last few miles to work that Monday morning. A few days on a game reserve would do her the world of good, photographing and sketching giraffes, zebras, leopards, lions and elephants. Then perhaps a tour of the Winelands, a taste
