Empire of Lies

Andrew Klavan is a first-rate thriller writer, whose work I have admired for a long time. Years ago, he wrote a number of fast-paced novels under the pen-name Keith Peterson and I remember enjoying one which was called The Scarred Man. As a screenwriter, he was responsible for adapting Simon Brett’s non-series psychological suspense novel A Shock to the System and more recently he’s produced a number of highly successful blockbusters, including True Crime. True Crime is a classic race-against-time story, which handles conventional material in an adroit and compelling way.

I therefore fell upon his latest book, Empire of Lies, with a great deal of enthusiasm. The main character is Jason Harrow, who has got over a wild past and become a Christian conservative leading a respectable and principled life. But he is dragged out of his comfort zone by a call from a former lover and soon finds himself plunged into a terrorist plot.

I relish the idea that Klavan is hostile to political correctness, and I like the idea that he rebels against the notion that literature is a no-go area for people who hold conservative views. He argues on his blog for conservatives to express their values with ‘courage, openness and honesty.’ Fair enough. But I must admit that I did not warm to Empire of Lies as much as I have to previous Klavans. The story-line did not grab me, and I felt that possibly he was allowing his personal views to intrude into the story to too great an extent. So, a bit of a let-down as far as I was concerned. But it’s only fair to add that various other people have responded very positively to this novel. And one thing is for sure. Klavan is an interesting and intelligent writer and I shall certainly read him again.

Half Broken Things

It is very difficult to work in the same territory as Barbara Vine and not be completely overshadowed. But Morag Joss managed it with a quite magnificent novel, worthy of Vine at her best, Half Broken Things. It’s one of the best novels of psychological suspense that I have read in the last ten years.

So I approached the televised version of the book – which appeared on the small screen last year; I’m characteristically late in catching up with it – with mixed feelings. I wanted the tv programme to be as good as the novel, but doubted whether it would be possible.

Happily, my fears were unfounded. Thanks to a superb cast, led by the delightful and compelling Penelope Wilton, here at her considerable best, the screen version was gripping from start to finish. This is a wonderful story of self-deception, involving Wilton as a slightly barmy house-sitter who ‘adopts’ an odd couple who have only just met, and the young woman’s soon to be born baby. What follows is poignant and terrible.

If you haven’t read the book, or seen the tv adaptation, you have a treat in store.

The Faber Diary

Faber and Faber have a long track record of publishing important and interesting work, and some of the classic titles in the company’s backlist are celebrated in a 2009 Diary that they have kindly sent to me. Effective marketing, because I'm impressed. It is an attractively produced publication and a well-conceived reminder of the calibre of their books.

According to the introduction to the diary, T.S. Eliot joined Michael Faber on the company’s board ‘and the story goes that Walter De La Mare suggested adding a second, fictitious Faber to balance the company name’ – a story I find rather appealing. Auden was published by Faber, and so too were Hughes and Plath, as well as major dramatists such as Stoppard and Osborne. Novelists on the list have included William Golding, Lawrence Durrell, Paul Auster and Milan Kundera.

Faber have also published first-rate crime writers,including a lawyer-novelist whom I have long admired, the late Cyril Hare as well as such major figures as P.D.James and Michael Dibdin.

This generously illustrated diary strikes me as a splendid way of celebrating the quality of Faber’s output, as well as eighty years of publishing. Long may they continue.

The Dedicatee

I’ve dedicated Dancing for the Hangman to Mandy Little. She’s my literary agent, and has been since I first sent out the original manuscript of what became my debut novel, All the Lonely People. Mandy liked the story, but suggested some (very reasonable) changes and then found a publisher for the book.

She and I have been together ever since, and I greatly appreciate her loyalty and commitment – not least because I certainly haven’t earned her a vast amount of money in commission. Nevertheless, she has always had faith in my work, and that means a lot to any writer.

Mandy encouraged me to write a novel about the Crippen case several years ago, and it’s fair to say that Dancing for the Hangman would not have existed without her prompting. Not so long ago, she took me to Hilldrop Crescent, not too far from her offices, to see the site of Number 39 (the actual house was destroyed in the Blitz) where the Crippens lived. The excursion was followed by a very enjoyable lunch and the hours flew by, as they always do in her company.

The relationship between author and agent is very important. You need to feel you have someone batting on your side. I know plenty of authors who are disappointed in their agents, and this must be very disheartening. I’m lucky to have Mandy – hence the dedication.

The Private Patient

I was very pleased to be sent a review copy of the latest Adam Dalgleish mystery, The Private Patient, written by P.D.James. I’ve realised that I’ve barely mentioned James' work in almost a year of blog posts, and that is quite an omission, not only because she is undoubtedly one of the major British crime writers of the past half century, but also because I have a great deal of admiration for her and her work.

P.D. James is now 88, and she is certainly one of ‘the great and the good’ – her c.v. is deeply impressive, and she is a member of the House of Lords. As she points out in the dedication to this book, she has been published by Faber for ‘forty six unbroken years’ – a remarkable achievement by any standards. Her first book, Cover Her Face, was conventional detective fiction, but written nonetheless with a considerable assurance, and as her confidence grew, she established herself as a major figure in the genre. I’ve read almost all of her books, including an interesting non-fiction story about a real life case, The Maul and The Pear Tree, and my favourites are Death of an Expert Witness, Innocent Blood, A Certain Justice and, finest of all in my opinion, Devices and Desires.

James excels at ‘closed communities’. Dalgleish is her most popular character, and he was very well portrayed on television first by Roy Marsden and then by Martin Shaw, but I also liked Cordelia Gray from An Unsuitable Job for a Woman. (Cordelia’s reappearance, in The Skull Beneath the Skin, struck me as a rare misfire, and the television series featuring Cordelia didn’t do much for me either.) Of one thing I am certain - her best books will stand the test of time. She is one of the finest British detective novelists of this or any other generation.

Saturday Selection

Here's a new idea for this blog. I come across plenty of interesting books, either just published or soon to appear, and today I'm going to give a quick preview of some that have caught my eye. I may review some of them more fully at a later date (I won't review every single one - definitely not enough hours in the day!) If the idea of an occasional or regular Saturday Selection of this kind appeals, do let me know.

The Watcher was published last month by Avon as a paperback original (a rapidly growing trend; my Dancing for the Hangman is the first paperback original I've produced) and it's written by Grace Monroe. In fact, the authorial name conceals a partnership between Maria Thompson and Linda Watson-Brown. It features Brodie McLennan and the discovery of a woman's corpse at the foot of Edinburgh Castle, with the message 'more will die' written on her naked body, and it's hailed as an example of 'Tartan Noir'. Brodie is described as 'a headstrong young lawyer'. One or two of them about in real life, let alone fiction!

The Scandalous Life of the Lawless Sisters, published by Faber, is a just-published book by Philip Ardagh. I know his work from his very entertaining and popular children's stories, including the Eddie Dickens books. My son is a big fan of Ardagh, and this book applies new captions to pictures from Punch of 1880. Looks good.

Exposed, by Alex Kava, is published by Mira in December. FBI criminal profiler Maggie O'Dell has to expose a killer 'before her time runs out'. The killer's weapon 'is a deadly virus, virtually invisible and totally unexpected.' I haven't read Nebraska-based Kava's work previously, and her reviews on Amazon are somewhat mixed (though there is, of course, a debate about the merits of Amazon reviews) but her sales are apparently very high, so she looks like someone to watch.

Forgotten Book - The Big Clock

My contribution this week to Patti Abbott's series Friday's Forgotten Books is one of my all-time favourite American crime novels, Kenneth Fearing’s The Big Clock.

Fearing's name is less well known than those of some of the authors featured in this series of mystery classics, but his stunning thriller is undoubtedly one to be remembered on merit. Fearing was a notable poet in America’s Depression era, but with this novel, first published in 1946, he struck gold. The remarkable plot has been copied by other writers and has formed the basis of two oustanding films. The first starred Ray Milland and Charles Laughton, while the excellent remake ‘No Way Out’ starring Kevin Costner offered a fresh twist on an already complex story.

The writing of the novel is clipped and tense, the characterisation economical yet witty, and the pace frenetic. George Stroud is a charming, yet amoral executive working for a magazine empire run by Earl Janoth. Stroud embarks on a dangerous affair with Janoth’s mistress and when Janoth kills the woman, Stroud is the only witness who can pin him to the crime. The catch is that Janoth does not know that the man he saw in a shadowy street was Stroud – and he gives Stroud the job of tracking down the witness. Stroud knows that, if he is identified, he will be killed, and he has to use all his ruthless ingenuity to keep one step ahead of his desperate boss. This short novel is an unmissable triumph of style and plot. Not surprisingly, Fearing was unable in his subsequent books to match it.

Michael Clayton

A film that boasts input from the likes of that late, lamented pair Sydney Pollack and Anthony Minghella and a cast led by George Clooney, Tilda Swinton and Tom Wilkinson has a great deal going for it. So it’s no surprise that Michael Clayton won a great deal of acclaim when it reached the screen last year.

It’s billed as a thriller, a story about a corporate law firm’s ‘fixer’, played very effectively by Clooney, who is involved on the fringe of a law suit that in its longevity rivals Jarndyce versus Jarndyce – a mega-conglomerate called U-North is being sued by a group of plaintiffs whose health has been damaged by its products. A colleague (Tom Wilkinson, whom I have long admired) has a mental collapse after failing to take his medication: he suffers from bipolar disorder. But it also becomes clear that the sick, troubled man has stumbled upon a secret that could destroy U-North, and, amongst others, their brittle in-house counsel (Swinton, serving up another good performance.) Pollack, as so often, makes a relatively brief, but telling appearance as another of Clooney’s associates. The production values are consistently high.

So, with all these great ingredients, why didn’t I enjoy the film more? It has something to do with the structure of the story-line, which I thought bordered on the inept. For reasons unclear, much of the tale is told by way of flashback – a tricky device that needs more justification than we have here. It’s not an excessively long film, but still the action often drags.

Much of the problem lies with the basic story – strip away the window-dressing, and it’s neither original nor compelling. The bad guys go to so much trouble to eliminate Clooney and Wilkinson that I couldn’t fathom why they allowed the catastrophic memo that seals their fate to see the light of day. Things improve towards the end, but overall I was disappointed. It’s a thriller that seldom thrills. Far better to describe it as a character-based drama, with some very good acting.

Sarah Caudwell

I mentioned Sarah Caudwell in relation to her ‘forgotten book’, Thus Was Adonis Murdered. In fact, Sarah was someone whom I came to know slightly and I found her a fascinating companion.

We came across each other when I was asked by the ‘New Law Journal’ to write an article about her work – the commission came because we were two of the very few British lawyers writing crime fiction in those days, the others including Frances Fyfield and my long-time hero Michael Gilbert. I enjoyed talking to Sarah over the phone –she was a very charismatic, off-beat individual. Later, we met in London, and had a drink at the bar in the heart of the city which she had fictionalised as a watering place frequented by her barrister characters.

In person, she was striking to say the latest – the only woman I can recall socialising with who ever smoked a pipe, which she did incessantly (and since she died of lung cancer, it may be that, sadly, it proved to be the death of her.) She was fiercely intelligent, and very witty indeed. I wish she'd written more short stories, for 'An Acquaintance with Mr Collins' is superb, a modern classic of the short mystery form

I have the feeling she was a deeply complex, and very private, character, but her outward demeanour was jovial and gregarious. We met again a few times, for example at the 1995 Bouchercon, when a historical play she had written was performed, but I hardly saw her after that as she struggled with writer’s block, or possibly with some other demons.

Sarah Caudwell was a one-off, both as a person and a writer. I certainly won’t forget her.

Remembrance Day

11 November is always one of the most sobering days of the year. Even though it was many years ago, I vividly recall a visit to the Remembrance Day service at the Cenotaph in Whitehall, London. Very moving.

Today is perhaps also a suitable occasion to recall a classic detective story which not only opens on Armistice, or Remembrance Day, but in which the coincidence of events on that particular day is absolutely crucial to the story.

The book in question is The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club, by Dorothy L. Sayers. I was in my teens when I first read it, but a few years ago I caught up, very belatedly, with the tv version starring Ian Carmichael as Lord Peter Wimsey. It's not the best book Sayers ever wrote, but it nevertheless deserves to be ranked as a classic.

Speaking of Sayers, I've just been reading a tribute to her by Michael Gilbert, which is included in Dorothy L. Sayers: The Centenary Celebration, edited by Alzina Stone Dale. Gilbert knew her mainly through their many encounters at the Detection Club. It's a frank and fascinating personal memoir, written by a man who admired Sayers, but wasn't blind to her idiosyncrasies. He describes her combination of sophistication and immaturity in a compelling way that brings Sayers alive as well as any of the lengthier biographies.

And if you are a Sayers fan, Dale's book is well worth seeking out.