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Moving between the perspectives of Eve and Alice, the daughter of the school chaplain, Vaughan slowly and ominously unpicks the rotten core of Cleeve, a place where “female rage had little currency” and where privilege ends up being no protection. This is a classic whodunnit that moves at a slow pace for the first 1/2 then ramps up towards the end.
He has that nothing-to-lose attitude, given that his career is swirling down the toilet bowl anyway. The writing is lyrical at times, the descriptions of the surroundings create a wonderful atmosphere which contrasts sharply with the discoveries that Jake makes. And though his and Livia's lust for each other is teased to an extreme, their scenes together are consistently enjoyable in an adult way. One thing that I was a little disappointed with was that, like Jake, I am a huge fan of crime fiction and, pretty early on, I guessed (correctly, which is unlike me) who the murderer was. The second one is pretty much written and being proof edited and I’ve actually finished the first draft of the third one.I wondered if this was going to be a kind of homage to the golden age authors he clearly reveres, but although he references many of them entertainingly, his style is very much his own. We are, together, a burnt-out ex-cop, a beautiful vet and a fairly eccentric botanist… I don’t think we should be desecrating a mausoleum”) and by the increasing sense of menace, as Jake digs into what happened to the dead girl. I love the cover of this book and with Stig's creative writing it sets the scene and landscape of Little Sky. Jake leaves for a fresh start, but everything isn’t quite as beautiful as it seems following the annual treasure hunt and he winds up pulled into old boots to assist with solving the mystery of an uncovered death! In March 2014, Abell started co-presenting a show on LBC Radio alongside Sky News television presenter Kay Burley from 8am to 11am on Sundays.
The partners deliver a few punchlines of their own in this fast-moving story that’s replete with twists and danger. And secondly, you can tell that Stig Abell is a massive lover of crime fiction and thrillers, in the way he has woven many names into the storyline, a real homage to the greats!
One day he receives a letter from his reclusive uncle – he has left Jake his property in the middle of the countryside. The series is about a detective, Jake Jackson, who leaves an unnamed city, and goes and lives in Little Sky, in this beautiful desolate countryside with no internet or phone lines, and then gets drawn back into the world of crime. After his failed marriage and he thinks it is the best time to retire from his job as a London based detective. A village tradition involves hunting for the 'bones' of a local Saint - the bones being a representative bag of sticks. Stig Abell is a successful and well-known British journalist and this is his first venture into fiction.
Anyway, the partners complement each other: Taylor is the more rational and level-headed, while Brodie blatantly disregards jurisdictional boundaries when he needs to. I enjoyed getting to know Jake and seeing his interactions with the existing residents in this tiny area of the countryside. Though Covid isn’t mentioned, the book captures really nicely the atmosphere of those first months of the pandemic, when self-sufficiency was back in fashion, people stayed home and learned to do basic things, and let their hair grow long.Geleidelijk aan begint er meer spanning te komen in het verhaal en gaat het meer op een thriller lijken. I enjoyed being back in the company of these well-remembered characters – but really, all this sequel did was make me want to read the original again. He is married to Faye, but they have struggled to start a family and the stress and the pressure has forced them apart. But her youth, friendliness and beauty caused her to become an object of attraction, even obsession, for several of the men in this woman-starved community. One of the best features of the book is the role of detective stories in the plot, especially the likes of Sherlock Holmes and Agatha Christie.
De spanning wordt na ruim de helft van het boek goed opgebouwd en je wordt nieuwsgierig wat er nu gebeurd is en wie dan uiteindelijk de dader is. Before he died, it seems, Felix Vodyanov was linked to a passenger ferry that sank in 1994, an even earlier U.Alle personages in het boek zijn goed uitgewerkt en je leert deze goed kennen, hoewel je ook misleid wordt. But things don’t go to plan and one of his new friends ends up dead and his life is also on the line. Before long, Jake is involved in digging up the past and trying to discover who the bones belonged to and whether any of the local inhabitants were involved. Death Under a Little Sky (HarperCollins) is journalist Stig Abell’s first novel and a joyful dive into the detective genre.
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