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Book Review – To Die For, by Colin Ward

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Angela Marsons’ tough but tortured Detective Inspector Kim Stone featured in my blog in April. Ironically, only 6 miles from Kim’s base in the Black Country, Colin Ward’s DI Mike Stone is operating out of Aston CID. Are they perhaps related?

Another detective with a troubled past

I sometimes think Ruth Rendell cornered the market in crime stories about happily married detectives with her Wexford series, set in rural Sussex. Kim and Mike Stone, in the dynamic and densely populated West Midlands, face completely different personal and professional challenges. Just like Kim, Mike lives a single life, has a troubled past and is tasked with tracking down a serial killer. That’s where the similarities end. Mike is by no means a loner. He enjoys the buzz of managing his team of sleuths. The pages of the book crackle with the excitement of the incident room as ideas are captured on the whiteboard and underlings despatched to follow leads. A depraved murderer is slaughtering young mothers, and Mike must find him before more families are smashed apart. There is a heavy focus on police procedure. This is fascinating, yet doesn’t detract from the rising tension when more bodies are found and the killer begins taunting Mike with texts.

Twists in the tale

Birmingham provides a kaleidoscopic background to this thriller, from smart bars to parks to the sprawling estates that ring the city’s outer perimeter. I suspect anyone who knows Brum will work out how the killer is transporting his victims well before the nerve-racking showdown. However, other readers are unlikely to guess. There are still plenty of twists in the tale. For example, although Colin Ward sprinkles clues throughout the book, it was an agreeable shock to me when the killer was finally unmasked. I didn’t see it coming.

A Book Review of Colin Ward's Birmingham crime thriller To Die For

Carries the reader with it until the very last word

The book isn’t perfect – as a writer myself, I tend to spot typos and repetition, and I found a couple of dozen. However, the story is well-written and so compelling that I couldn’t stop turning the pages. Mike Stone’s life, sanity and love hang in the balance unless he can stop the killer. To Die For carries the reader with it until the very last word.

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Birmingham is a fascinating backdrop to Colin Ward’s book, and it also features in three of the tales in my short story collection, Something In The City – get it free here

Thriller of the Month – Silent Scream, by Angela Marsons

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Thriller of the Month – Silent Scream, by Angela Marsons

British thriller writer Angela Marsons has sold 2m books. It’s easy to see why when you read her first crime thriller, Silent Scream (currently a bargain 99p on Amazon). The first page features a child’s clandestine burial, while a well-to-do woman is murdered in her bath in the next chapter. Marsons grabs the reader by the throat right from the start, and never lets go.

This twist-packed detective story has a very American feel, with the lawmen’s banter calling to mind vintage cop shows such as Hill Street Blues. However, like its author, heroine DI Kim Stone is based firmly in the Black Country.

The post-industrial urban sprawl to the west of Birmingham is sympathetically described. Marsons makes it clear that it’s not all high-unemployment sink estates; there are wealthy areas too. Occasionally, the distinctive local dialect crops up in characters’ conversations, but Marsons displays a light touch with that and there is no struggle to understand them.

So what of the story? Kim Stone finds herself chasing the serial killer of individuals who worked at a children’s home that burned down ten years before. Having established a link between the victims, Stone is in a race against time to protect remaining employees of the institution. Her suspicions that bodies will be found in the home’s grounds sadly proves correct. That triggers emotions for Kim Stone, who spent much of her early life in care. In fact, although perceived by others as cold and lacking in social graces, Stone is extremely emotional below the surface. In particular, she is determined to stick up for those without a voice. There is never any doubt that Stone will find the murderer, because she is so highly motivated by her desire to bring justice to the dispossessed.

Naturally, there are obstacles along the way – as well as plenty of red herrings and twists. The Queen of Suspense, Marsons keeps us guessing. Both the unmasking of the killer, and subsequent heartwarming ending, came as a complete surprise to me. They were, however, completely credible.

The book is a page turner, and I polished it off in a day. The only off note for me was Marsons’ rather harsh description of the Bull & Bladder pub. Luckily, she admitted the error and apologised in a later book. As a temple to Bathams Bitter, the alehouse serves some of the best beer in the land, and I’m jealous that one of her characters calls it his local. Having said that, I wouldn’t want to share the fate she has in store for him…

This is the first in a long series about Kim Stone. I’ll definitely work my way through the rest!

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I’m also a crime thriller writer, focusing on the buzzy British cities of Birmingham and London. Read “5 minute crime thriller” The Gap here.