Time of Death (Tom Thorne Novels)

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To Mark: I did love this but please pretty please could we have one with the whole team in London soon please please please? When Helen realises that the man is the husband of an old friend of hers, she insists on going to Polesford to offer support.

I had been knocking stars off my review in my head before it even landed on my doormat on publication day. I love the characters of Helen, Thorne and Hendricks and have become very comfortable with these characters, their banter, their humour, sarcasm and intelligence…the dialogue is exceptionally natural and believable and the characters develop and grow with each new novel. There were enough clues to point me in the direction I took only to have the rug pulled out from beneath my feet towards the novels end. Following not too far off his disastrous outing to Bardsey Island this book opens with Tom and Helen on a much needed holiday in the Cotswolds. The plot element on which this gruesome mystery turns is certainly one of the cleverest and most satisfying that I've read for ages.

I read a couple of his early books a good while ago – ‘Sleepyhead’ and one other – but something about ‘Good as Dead’ put me off. This book is a little different to the previous Billingham books I've read as Thorne and Weeks are not on their own turf so it's more about Weeks relationship with the suspects partner and Thorne doing his own off-the-record investigation. When one of the missing girls turns up dead, the police believe they have their killer and all of the evidence seems to suggest so, but Tom Thorne is not so sure and his suspicions soon put him at odds with the local police force while he heads towards a showdown with a ruthless, and bat-shit crazy killer. As the local police have no interest in alternate theories or suspects, he looks into the crimes himself - and the further he investigates, the more it looks as though Bates has been expertly framed. She's either withdrawn or spoiling for a fight, leaving Tom baffled as to the cause of her behaviour.

I've written so many reviews recently complaining about too many commas, too many similes, appalling spelling and grammar, having to go back through a book due to not remembering who So-and-So is.I love Mark Billingham and this series featuring Tom Thorne is like settling down with a an old friend, in a comfortable armchair,for a chat! The 103 third parties who use cookies on this service do so for their purposes of displaying and measuring personalized ads, generating audience insights, and developing and improving products.

I do love crimes that are set in small communities, there is something very distinctive about the way they operate, with everyone knowing so much about each other’s lives, the suspicion of outsiders, the gossip and the protection and tolerance of their own, up to a point.Forty-three-year-old Stephen Bates a local man is questioned in connection with the abduction of Poppy Johnson and the disappearance of Jessica Toms. Abduction, missing people/children, and when someone bounces along and interferes in the investigation, always a treat to read, things just not going to plan. It was a bit of an inconceivable set-up, and the extent to which the two of them get involved in solving the crime (despite there being a supposedly competent local force who could/should do so) didn't quite wash with me. While he has no authority or connection to the case he begins to question the way the investigation is going and starts to pursue avenues of his own. Her support is much needed as the evidence piles up quickly, one of the girls turns up dead, and Stephen Bates is arrested for the crimes.

I like a few mystery series and am a very loyal reader of each book in the series as they come out -- Louise Penny, Michael Connelly, Elizabeth George, Sara Paretsky, Camilla Lackberg to name a few. Not for long though because when the news comes through of a crime is committed in Helen’s home town, Polesford, her ears prick up.Now the unspoken rule with crime books is that the author can't just pluck the guilty party out of thin air at the end of the book, the reader must have met the guilty party during the narrative, and using this logic I figured I sussed it all out by the mid-way point. This was different to the standard Thorne books as for the first part, he is little more than a bystander, supporting Helen who has a much bigger part to play in this book. Time of Death is the 13th mystery in Mark Billingham’s series featuring Detectives Tom Thorne and Helen Weeks.